Hello everybody. I just have a few thoughts before I turn this over to Eddie and let him talk to you for a while. I'm increasingly jealous of several members of our group who plan to stay here for a year. Rico even went so far as to only pay for a one-way ticket over. Now he will be graduating after finishing this fall semester and he is in the process of getting a license to teach English so our situations aren't quite the same. Maybe by December I'll be ready to come home; last night and part of today Eddie and I were genuinely bored for the first time since we've been here, aside from some of the time up in Segura de Leon. We'll see. I'm very proud of the work I'm doing with the Ashbrook program etc. etc. but I always wonder what it would feel like to be entirely untethered, just enough money in the bank not to worry and your life in a backpack. In my more lucid moments I know I romanticize such a life but I'm wired wrong for it. How does one find a gym when one is backpacking from place to place? I might be able to stomach it for a month or two at a time given the right part of the world to wander and the right traveling companion(s).
Lastly, the watch the stupidest sports over here. There's a channel called TDP, total deportes, that has 24/7 sports coverage. It is just laughable the stuff they cover. Their programming today was the Spanish handball league. All last night it was coverage of some kayaking competition, and most of last week it was coverage of some form of gymnastics/floor exercise competition I've never seen before. 'Gymnastics? Come on that's not too bad.' you might say. Oh, but this was not beams and rings and strength paired with balance and endurance. This was a bunch of women from Russia and former Soviet bloc countries dancing and spinning with rubber bouncy balls, hula hoops, streamers and batons. For four and five hours on end. I hesitate to say so but it made the WNBA look appealing, and I didn't think anything could do that. Anyways, here's Eddie:
Hello Horst family and friends, my name is Edward Lipsey or Eddie. I'll start by telling you what an outstanding person Silas is. He's a good friend to have. the first day i met Silas our host brother and me greeted him at the door. First Pablo said to him "Hola Silas" and he said to Pablo "Hola." Then I said to Silas, "Hola" and he ignored me. He thought I was a friend of Pablo. He later told me "Dude, i thought you were a friend of Pablo, and I thought to myself, why is this grown man hanging with my eleven year old brother?" Silas and I get along well, we share many of the same ideas and have pretty much the same perspective on life. He actually helped start working out again. I stopped last year when i quit my school's football team. He's a monster in the gym, and I have extreme difficulty keeping up with him, but I'm not complaining the results are great, the ladies love it. I really lucked out on getting Silas as my roommate, couldn't be any more content.
We are truly blessed to have this opportunity, I have gained so much in the month that I've been here. Not just not material from school, but about other cultures, religions, and how this melting pot can coexist with one another with seemingly no or little conflict. I can't thank God and my parents enough for letting me take the experience of a life time. One thing I've taken for granted or abused you could say is the ability to go out every night. Spain is very different from the states in a sense of going out and partying. Last week, i went out everyday and tried enjoying every moment as if it were my last. In a way, that's the right idea, but in large quantities, it's not. I was physically drained and couldn't function to well. Silas then kinda told me to take it easy and despite the fact we're in Spain we are also in school, but in more words. So now, I'm moderating pretty much everything I do. One thing I'm neither of us are getting enough of is interaction with Spanish women. the Spanish women are amazingly gorgeous and many are extroverts. They enjoy themselves and generally all who are associated with them at the time being are enjoying themselves as well. But for us, there is a hindrance, the language barrier. Silas can communicate a heck of a lot better than me, but we still struggle to understand. I really would like to get know a Spanish women and have her as a friend, but I'm nervous because of my lack of Spanish speaking abilities, and their beauty intimidates me, well, at times. Before this semester is over, I will accomplish interacting with Spanish women to perfection. I've actually met a young Spanish lady whom I can understand very well because she doesn't speak the slang of Sevilla. Her Spanish is well enunciated, concise, and clear. She lives in Alicante, Spain, which is a forty minute flight from where we are. Silas and I plan to go to Alicante at the end of October, more of the reason are the beaches, but we may pay her a visit.
The family is great. My birthday was September 11th. When Silas and I came home from running in park Maria Louisa, and Reme surprised me with an ice cream birthday cake, which was amazing. She is an awesome cook as well. It seems we have new meal or combination of a meal everyday. My favorite is probably the lasagna. It's peculiar, but i don't care I love it. All in all this trip will change my life forever and definitely influence new views and customs that I adopt into my philosophy on life. I hope all is well with you all, and God bless.
Eddie Lipsey
Friday, September 30, 2011
Thursday, September 29, 2011
It's been a pretty normal week. I've actually slept at night, twice this week, and Eddie has been sleeping well too. Not going out during the school week sure helps. There are only a couple of happenings and thoughts I'd like to relate right now:
First, I have an incredible opportunity here I wasn't aware of until today. For those who don't know already, as part of the Ashbrook program at Ashland every scholar is required to write a thesis on an approved subject of their choice. During our Juinor years we begin thinking and probing subjects and collecting information, and then spend most of our senior year writing and revising and re-writing and on and on. It is quite the process and quite the opportunity to truly dig into a topic which fascinates us. We have a ton of professional help on hand int he form of Ashbrook professors and outside advisers etc. Long story short I'm set on writing about Islam, specifically what is know as Islam's "golden age" of tolerance in medieval Spain. In talking to one of my professors about a paper for my 3 cultures (Muslims, Jews, Christians) class today she informed me I could go down to a library in the city center here in Seville and get my hands on original documents. Not copies or transcriptions. The documents themselves, proclamations of new laws, edicts, government records. I about fell out of my chair. Once I calmed down I realized they're probably all written in Arabic so looking at them might not do me much good but it just seemed like another example of how blessed I am to have been given the chance to study here. I'll have a little more to say and show on the subject after we visit Cordoba Saturday. Cordoba was the center of the Andalusian Caliphate for a little over a hundred years way back during the 10th and 11th century. Much of the architecture survives from the era.
Secondly, Eddie and I experienced an......explosion.....earlier this week that truly demonstrates some things about life are just universal, no matter what country you're in. Pablito, our little brother over here, had his phone taken away before school started because his parents wanted him to focus on his studies. Could be any teenager in the states right? Well he made a drastic error in judgement Monday. Reme brought him home from band practice around 5 and they needed to make a quick turnaround to get him moving towards water polo practice. Instead of putting away his band stuff and changing to get ready for practice Pablo made a beeline for his computer first thing to check his Facebook and communicate with all his little girlfriends. Big mistake. While he was at practice, Reme and Juan Antonio told us they thought it was a problem so they were changing the network password for the wifi and if we told Pablo what it was they would hang us up by our thumbs, or something like that. I understand most of what they say and the sentiment there was more important than the specific threat. Now, if it was me I would have told Pablo when we were driving home from practice what the deal was. You have the kid enclosed in the car and he can't go off. Juan Antonio elected to wait until after Pablo had finished eating at 9 45. Eddie and I were doing homework in the living room but even if this apartment were ten times as big we would have heard Pablo's eruption. He's 13 so I can relate to some degree. I certainly remember thinking there were unfair happenings that would effectively end my life. That being said, Pablo just went off. Before Juan Antonio could even finish explaining the why to Pablo he had jumped up and locked himself in his room. Juan Antonio calmly told him to open the door and let him finish speaking to him for at least ten minutes. Pablo adopted a tone which Eddie and I agreed without a shadow of a doubt would have gotten us kicked out of our houses or worse. As Eddie put it, "I used that tone with my mom. Once." Now possibly this is just a difference in parenting 'technique' deal, but Pablo never unlocked his door until the next morning and he quite literally screamed at his parents through the door for half an hour. Not quite insults but what I picked up was typical teenager stuff, "you've taken everything from me, my life is over, you're horrible parents," etc. Eddie and I remain incredulous that Pablo retains the use of his motor skills after his performance. Neither of our parents would have put up with it for more than a few seconds. Life in the apartment is pretty normal once again; Pablo simply has to ask one of his parents to use a netbook when he wants to. It's odd but not really my business.
I'm thinking I'd like to have Eddie do the blog a couple times this semester because while we're taking in the same experience I know his perspective will be distinct and interesting for you all. Since I've been slacking the last couple weeks with posts I'll have him do his first one tomorrow.
First, I have an incredible opportunity here I wasn't aware of until today. For those who don't know already, as part of the Ashbrook program at Ashland every scholar is required to write a thesis on an approved subject of their choice. During our Juinor years we begin thinking and probing subjects and collecting information, and then spend most of our senior year writing and revising and re-writing and on and on. It is quite the process and quite the opportunity to truly dig into a topic which fascinates us. We have a ton of professional help on hand int he form of Ashbrook professors and outside advisers etc. Long story short I'm set on writing about Islam, specifically what is know as Islam's "golden age" of tolerance in medieval Spain. In talking to one of my professors about a paper for my 3 cultures (Muslims, Jews, Christians) class today she informed me I could go down to a library in the city center here in Seville and get my hands on original documents. Not copies or transcriptions. The documents themselves, proclamations of new laws, edicts, government records. I about fell out of my chair. Once I calmed down I realized they're probably all written in Arabic so looking at them might not do me much good but it just seemed like another example of how blessed I am to have been given the chance to study here. I'll have a little more to say and show on the subject after we visit Cordoba Saturday. Cordoba was the center of the Andalusian Caliphate for a little over a hundred years way back during the 10th and 11th century. Much of the architecture survives from the era.
Secondly, Eddie and I experienced an......explosion.....earlier this week that truly demonstrates some things about life are just universal, no matter what country you're in. Pablito, our little brother over here, had his phone taken away before school started because his parents wanted him to focus on his studies. Could be any teenager in the states right? Well he made a drastic error in judgement Monday. Reme brought him home from band practice around 5 and they needed to make a quick turnaround to get him moving towards water polo practice. Instead of putting away his band stuff and changing to get ready for practice Pablo made a beeline for his computer first thing to check his Facebook and communicate with all his little girlfriends. Big mistake. While he was at practice, Reme and Juan Antonio told us they thought it was a problem so they were changing the network password for the wifi and if we told Pablo what it was they would hang us up by our thumbs, or something like that. I understand most of what they say and the sentiment there was more important than the specific threat. Now, if it was me I would have told Pablo when we were driving home from practice what the deal was. You have the kid enclosed in the car and he can't go off. Juan Antonio elected to wait until after Pablo had finished eating at 9 45. Eddie and I were doing homework in the living room but even if this apartment were ten times as big we would have heard Pablo's eruption. He's 13 so I can relate to some degree. I certainly remember thinking there were unfair happenings that would effectively end my life. That being said, Pablo just went off. Before Juan Antonio could even finish explaining the why to Pablo he had jumped up and locked himself in his room. Juan Antonio calmly told him to open the door and let him finish speaking to him for at least ten minutes. Pablo adopted a tone which Eddie and I agreed without a shadow of a doubt would have gotten us kicked out of our houses or worse. As Eddie put it, "I used that tone with my mom. Once." Now possibly this is just a difference in parenting 'technique' deal, but Pablo never unlocked his door until the next morning and he quite literally screamed at his parents through the door for half an hour. Not quite insults but what I picked up was typical teenager stuff, "you've taken everything from me, my life is over, you're horrible parents," etc. Eddie and I remain incredulous that Pablo retains the use of his motor skills after his performance. Neither of our parents would have put up with it for more than a few seconds. Life in the apartment is pretty normal once again; Pablo simply has to ask one of his parents to use a netbook when he wants to. It's odd but not really my business.
I'm thinking I'd like to have Eddie do the blog a couple times this semester because while we're taking in the same experience I know his perspective will be distinct and interesting for you all. Since I've been slacking the last couple weeks with posts I'll have him do his first one tomorrow.
Monday, September 26, 2011
October
This week got off on the absolute right foot. I slept an incredible 6-7 hours last night and Eddie felt better today, good enough to return to the gym after being out of commission since Friday night. I know I have mentioned our workouts etc. in passing but since it's a big part of what I love to do can you humor me on this one while I talk about our gym experience here? Please? If it's really too painful just skip to the next paragraph about funny stuff that's been going on, Eddie-isms and interaction with the family.
Ok so, gym. I think I've mentioned the gym is very modern, with all the equipment one would expect in a high end American gym, with the exception of deadlifting platforms which are also sometimes absent in our gyms because they are really only heavily used by athletes and power lifters. Given how much Eddie and I paid for our membership I'm glad they have just about everything we could need. The people at the gym are pretty much just like Americans in their exercise. They all have differing levels of intensity and knowledge etc, and the gym offers the very latest in exercise classes like BodyPump, spin classes and so forth. Where they are not American is in their attitude towards their fellow lifters. Here we find the typical Spanish mindset once again: nobody, and I mean nobody, puts anything away when they are done with it. If you want to find a specific weight for something the last place you would look is in it's rack where it ought to be. Just a little tic which surprised me. The bigger issue is much as we have found it anywhere else, which is to say before they hear us talk to them in Spanish all they do is stare, and not kindly or with curiosity. In their defense I have been, as Eddie so eloquently puts it, "putting us through some crazy stuff." I have always been under the impression that the gym is a place to let loose physically and since I no longer have the regular competition of organized sports I can really only compete against myself and whoever I'm working out with. People understand it at home, especially in Ashland but also home home. Here it seems almost like I've farted audibly in church and then laughed about it or something. Their faces seem to say "what are you doing and who let you through the door?" It is getting better because we speak to them in Spanish when we have to interact and today we got some free help from one of the trainers and he was very cool about it. Nobody has yelled at us or anything so up front but Eddie and I both get a feeling while we're there that everyone is staring. It should fade before the semester is over. When we run in the park it's much more normal because just about everyone is running or walking and I'm not sure you could run in an "American" way. Maybe beat your chest and spit a lot.
Mom asked for more pictures of people so I'll just dump those here. I don't have any of our family yet but I'll get some up eventually I promise:
Eddie and I share ice cream sometimes. What of it?
Ahhh mira. From left to right: Paula from Miami who speaks fluent Portugesa and is awesome, Anna from Chicago also awesome (Eddie and I are going to Portugal with these two in two weeks) Eddie, Colleen from....I forget honestly, but she's cool, and Haylee whose origins I have also forgotten but who came from the University of Hawaii.
We cut through the park if it's early enough and still unlocked on our way to the other side of the Rio Guadalquivir.
Lets see. Christine is on the near left and she was in an earlier post, and the other guy in the picture in white is Rico who I wrote about last time.
Eddie was excited about the train in Jerez that took us around the winery.
I hope I didn't create the impression that there is friction with our family. Quite the opposite, Eddie and I love Reme and Juan Antonio and Pablito is just a riot. He's 13 so everything to do with girls is hilarious, and just about every night we joke about the girls in the program and Eddie and I have him in stitches. Last night Eddie busted out his best Goofy impression and Pablo about died. Tonight Reme and Eddie and I discussed marriage as an institution and our attitude towards it personally, then the American attitude and the more relaxed European approach, pros and cons. Then we talked about the difficulty of having children and how Eddie and I certainly do not feel we could handle that at this point in our lives without steady jobs or finished degrees etc. Not that we are in danger of it, but it was an interesting conversation. Our Culture and Society of Spain teacher is a wonderful old lady, originally from California. She became absolutely smitten with this country way back when she came here to study and has been teaching here since the earth cooled or so. She is an incredible resource for traveling ideas, where to eat, what to do etc. I mention her for two reasons, firstly because she's Judy she knows one of the best instructors of Sevillian Flamenco and offered us a chance to sign up for classes twice a week starting in October. I can't dance for beans, but given the laid back nature of our group and the once-in-a-lifetime nature of the opportunity I didn't hesitate to sign up. The very favorable ratio of attractive girls to guys in our program also factored into the equation. Secondly though, I loved what she told us about her second love after Spain, John, the only American ever to work his way up to fully professional bullfighter status. He has been dead some ten or fifteen years now I think. One of the girls in our class asked if they were married. Judy replied, "oh no. We were never married. But we were madly in love and I never worried about that." It sounded so perfectly European, in the best way.
Ok so, gym. I think I've mentioned the gym is very modern, with all the equipment one would expect in a high end American gym, with the exception of deadlifting platforms which are also sometimes absent in our gyms because they are really only heavily used by athletes and power lifters. Given how much Eddie and I paid for our membership I'm glad they have just about everything we could need. The people at the gym are pretty much just like Americans in their exercise. They all have differing levels of intensity and knowledge etc, and the gym offers the very latest in exercise classes like BodyPump, spin classes and so forth. Where they are not American is in their attitude towards their fellow lifters. Here we find the typical Spanish mindset once again: nobody, and I mean nobody, puts anything away when they are done with it. If you want to find a specific weight for something the last place you would look is in it's rack where it ought to be. Just a little tic which surprised me. The bigger issue is much as we have found it anywhere else, which is to say before they hear us talk to them in Spanish all they do is stare, and not kindly or with curiosity. In their defense I have been, as Eddie so eloquently puts it, "putting us through some crazy stuff." I have always been under the impression that the gym is a place to let loose physically and since I no longer have the regular competition of organized sports I can really only compete against myself and whoever I'm working out with. People understand it at home, especially in Ashland but also home home. Here it seems almost like I've farted audibly in church and then laughed about it or something. Their faces seem to say "what are you doing and who let you through the door?" It is getting better because we speak to them in Spanish when we have to interact and today we got some free help from one of the trainers and he was very cool about it. Nobody has yelled at us or anything so up front but Eddie and I both get a feeling while we're there that everyone is staring. It should fade before the semester is over. When we run in the park it's much more normal because just about everyone is running or walking and I'm not sure you could run in an "American" way. Maybe beat your chest and spit a lot.
Mom asked for more pictures of people so I'll just dump those here. I don't have any of our family yet but I'll get some up eventually I promise:
I hope I didn't create the impression that there is friction with our family. Quite the opposite, Eddie and I love Reme and Juan Antonio and Pablito is just a riot. He's 13 so everything to do with girls is hilarious, and just about every night we joke about the girls in the program and Eddie and I have him in stitches. Last night Eddie busted out his best Goofy impression and Pablo about died. Tonight Reme and Eddie and I discussed marriage as an institution and our attitude towards it personally, then the American attitude and the more relaxed European approach, pros and cons. Then we talked about the difficulty of having children and how Eddie and I certainly do not feel we could handle that at this point in our lives without steady jobs or finished degrees etc. Not that we are in danger of it, but it was an interesting conversation. Our Culture and Society of Spain teacher is a wonderful old lady, originally from California. She became absolutely smitten with this country way back when she came here to study and has been teaching here since the earth cooled or so. She is an incredible resource for traveling ideas, where to eat, what to do etc. I mention her for two reasons, firstly because she's Judy she knows one of the best instructors of Sevillian Flamenco and offered us a chance to sign up for classes twice a week starting in October. I can't dance for beans, but given the laid back nature of our group and the once-in-a-lifetime nature of the opportunity I didn't hesitate to sign up. The very favorable ratio of attractive girls to guys in our program also factored into the equation. Secondly though, I loved what she told us about her second love after Spain, John, the only American ever to work his way up to fully professional bullfighter status. He has been dead some ten or fifteen years now I think. One of the girls in our class asked if they were married. Judy replied, "oh no. We were never married. But we were madly in love and I never worried about that." It sounded so perfectly European, in the best way.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Don't leave your homework till Sunday
Eugh. New record. I crawled into bed at 6 this morning. I had the best night though and I think it was absolutely worthwhile. There's a guy here in our program named Rico who is from Indiana. He's just an absolute riot, always upbeat and ready to go out and do something and also honest and straightforward. He's also gay, but not the sort of flamboyant and melodramatically over-the-top all the time. All in all just a cool guy to have around and I'm glad to have met him. Anyways, he had expressed some frustration earlier in the week that our group is always going out to bars and dance clubs but when he wants to go to a gay club everybody just shuts him down. Eddie and I expressed a willingness to go and he thought we were just saying it to make him feel better but we convinced him that no, we really were perfectly fine going out with him and having a good time regardless. Eddie wasn't feeling too well last night so he called it quits early but I was still more than happy to go with Rico. Several of the girls in our group bailed so it ended up being Rico, Ellie (from Boston) and I. 10E at the door got us in and two free drinks, which comparatively is a very good deal. Many places we have been are 10E at the door and then you're not getting anything from the bar for less than 5-7E. I don't spend a whole lot of time thinking about how "comfortable" I am with my sexuality or any of that nonsense and I wasn't worried about being in a club full of gay guys at all. Eddie has expressed some apprehension about it, especially given that he has gotten hit on by guys at bars and clubs. My attitude going in was the right one I think. I'm not exactly sure how it works (though I could speculate) but people figured out pretty quickly I was straight. This caused a fair amount of disappointment among the male population there, especially the friendly gentleman who decided to take the liberty of running his hand up under my shirt all casual like. Surprisingly, I did not react poorly to any of the attention. I was friendly and smiled a lot, and herein lies one of the reasons it was such a worthwhile evening: I had several conversations with guys and girls, people I had never met before, in Spanish. When our group goes out we just use English for comfort's sake, and several of the bars we frequent are international hangouts so the opportunity to interact with Spaniards has been lamentably limited. Even better, Rico only has a very basic handle on Spanish so I ended up being de facto translator for him with several of the people he met. Hilarity ensued because Rico was pretty lit up, I was sober, he was trying to hit on these guys, but it was coming from me in the best way I knew how to express it. He got a couple numbers, and when we were heading home afterwards he expressed so much gratitude for my willingness to go out with him and just have a good time. Oh and walking afterwards we bought churros from a street stand. Best churro I have ever tasted. 5 AM and ravenous will do that to you.
Now, a comment on something kind of amusing that is going on with Eddie and I at home. I'm not entirely sure but I think we have lost our AC privileges. I believe I have mentioned the near-obsessive attitude towards the use of electricity in this society and especially with leaving lights on in a vacant room or having the AC running during the day. Eddie and I both clearly remember him turning off the AC when we left for the beach early Friday morning. When we got home Reme chewed us out for leaving it on again. I'm not sure who is right. I'm not going to call her a liar or crazy or anything, but either way it could be a very tough week without AC. The temperatures are supposed to be back up and Eddie and I don't sleep very well during the week as it is. Along with this, I'm having trouble discerning the tones used to speak to us. Most of the time it's normal sort of Mom talk when she is advising us or we're just talking about everyday stuff. But when something happens that she needs to advise us about the tone isn't advising. It's closer to yelling at a stupidly impetuous child. The best example occurred when we got back from the beach. Eddie thought he lost his credit/debit card on the beach. When we sat down to dinner we were both completely wiped out from being out all day and understandably subdued. When Reme asked how the day went Eddie related how he had been worried about the card but found it when he got home. Instead of commenting on how good it was that it didn't end up lost, she launched into 5 minutes of ripping Eddie apart for being stupid enough to take his card on a day visit. She told him to just take cash for anything where we didn't absolutely need a card or our passports. Eddie, exhausted and beginning to get frustrated as this went on, was unable to explain that he could not just take cash because he had none in his account and was waiting for his mother to move money into his checking later in the week. So Eddie and I just sort of sat there and let her berate us. I am not exaggerating when I say it was 5+ minutes. She went on and on, and she did wrap up by saying that if we lose something like that, and she has seen it with other students, it is so difficult to fix and she doesn't want it to happen to us. I think it might be something like my experience with Nick's family, all Cuban. If you were to hang out with a large group of them you would think they were all yelling at each other all the time. In reality, they are just loud people and when you put a lot of them together the volume goes up necessarily. They love each other to death and even if they do argue it's never truly vicious or combative. I know Reme only has our best interests at heart and Eddie and I are infinitely grateful for this family's willingness to take us in for this time. We'll just have to get used to taking in what it said and not how it is said.
Now, a comment on something kind of amusing that is going on with Eddie and I at home. I'm not entirely sure but I think we have lost our AC privileges. I believe I have mentioned the near-obsessive attitude towards the use of electricity in this society and especially with leaving lights on in a vacant room or having the AC running during the day. Eddie and I both clearly remember him turning off the AC when we left for the beach early Friday morning. When we got home Reme chewed us out for leaving it on again. I'm not sure who is right. I'm not going to call her a liar or crazy or anything, but either way it could be a very tough week without AC. The temperatures are supposed to be back up and Eddie and I don't sleep very well during the week as it is. Along with this, I'm having trouble discerning the tones used to speak to us. Most of the time it's normal sort of Mom talk when she is advising us or we're just talking about everyday stuff. But when something happens that she needs to advise us about the tone isn't advising. It's closer to yelling at a stupidly impetuous child. The best example occurred when we got back from the beach. Eddie thought he lost his credit/debit card on the beach. When we sat down to dinner we were both completely wiped out from being out all day and understandably subdued. When Reme asked how the day went Eddie related how he had been worried about the card but found it when he got home. Instead of commenting on how good it was that it didn't end up lost, she launched into 5 minutes of ripping Eddie apart for being stupid enough to take his card on a day visit. She told him to just take cash for anything where we didn't absolutely need a card or our passports. Eddie, exhausted and beginning to get frustrated as this went on, was unable to explain that he could not just take cash because he had none in his account and was waiting for his mother to move money into his checking later in the week. So Eddie and I just sort of sat there and let her berate us. I am not exaggerating when I say it was 5+ minutes. She went on and on, and she did wrap up by saying that if we lose something like that, and she has seen it with other students, it is so difficult to fix and she doesn't want it to happen to us. I think it might be something like my experience with Nick's family, all Cuban. If you were to hang out with a large group of them you would think they were all yelling at each other all the time. In reality, they are just loud people and when you put a lot of them together the volume goes up necessarily. They love each other to death and even if they do argue it's never truly vicious or combative. I know Reme only has our best interests at heart and Eddie and I are infinitely grateful for this family's willingness to take us in for this time. We'll just have to get used to taking in what it said and not how it is said.
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Cadiz Y Jerez de La Frontera
Ok so, yesterday we went on a school organized trip to a small town called Jerez in the morning and then on to the beach town of Cadiz in the afternoon. The morning was semi-interesting. We got to visit one of Europe's older and more prestigious wineries, Gonzales Byass where they make a world famous sherry. As you all probably know I'm not big on alcohol as it is. I do love history however, and so the visit was equal parts interesting and not for me. The casks and the process by which they make the sherry I knew nothing about going in so I learned a little bit. Boy are they ever proud of the tradition, and perhaps they have a right to be given the popularity of their Tio Pepe Sherry. It felt like a little piece of the Old World plopped down in the middle of city; they do all the collecting and processing the same way they did 150 years ago, and all of the evaluation etc. is done by hand. The only modernization as far as I could tell came in the form of their distribution processes and some of their bottling for the less prestigious brands. We all were offered free glasses of the driest and best sherry and one of something "sweeter". They both tasted about as good as beer ever tastes to me, which is to say it all tastes like pond scum and sweaty feet at best. Others in the group were more than happy to down their share and more. Then we headed for the beach.
On the first really cool, almost cold day in Spain we headed for the beach. It was really too bad because the temperature is supposed to climb back into the 90's this week in Sevilla and the 80's to the south where we were. Several of us, myself included, got in and swam anyhow. The water was nowhere near as cold as I've experienced on the west coast in San Diego, and even that water has absolutely nothing on the mountain runoff in the rivers of Colorado. So for me it was still a good beach day. Eddie and I played some soccer and ran around. The rest of the group drank. Boxes and boxes of cheap wine. I understand and even support wanting to have a good experience in Europe etc. etc. but yesterday my new friends went beyond a certain boundary. It may just be me but the majority of them were literally drinking from 2 when we got to the beach until 6:45 when we left. Okay if that is how you enjoy the beach more power to you. But then they went and brought the wine with them onto the bus ride back and proceeded to behave obnoxiously. They just got louder and louder and the majority of the bus was trying to rest. All of this would've just been kind of bothersome but tolerable, but then it reached a point where two girls spilled their wine on the floor. At that point Marisa, who works at ICS and was our guide and helper for the day came back and said that we weren't allowed to be drinking on the bus and to please clean up the mess. The first, typically American response: "Well, can we finish what we have? We can finish what we have right?" I wanted to punch this kid so hard he didn't wake up for days. Unbelievably disrespectful and ungrateful. All in all though the drinking was just a small part of the whole day and we really did have a great time at the beach. There are a few pictures below. I apologize for it being so few but I forgot to charge my camera battery. The beach really looks like just about any other beach, I know. The one really cool shot I got was of the cathedral of Cadiz, which was several miles down the beach. It cut an impressive figure among the other buildings. You can clearly see the Arabic influence in the domes, but Marisa assured me that it is now a Catholic cathedral. There is a ton of that all throughout southern Spain, Muslim architecture meshing seamlessly with Christian and Jewish influences. I'll put up more pictures if I can collect them from what other people took of yesterday.
I'm two weeks in now. I thank God every day for this opportunity, and of course without the support of Mom and Dad and all you family it wouldn't have been possible either.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Comments on Spanish Culture and Society
As promised I'd like to mention several of the aspects of being here that I've found particularly interesting and sometimes jarring in the negative sense. A week ago I was gushing like a girl going to shop for prom dresses about this country. I remain enamored, incredibly so. However, there are cultural and societal habits that I think move beyond some sort of simple difference in attitude between typically "American" and "Spanish". In no particular order:
The trash. I understand that any major city in the world is going to struggle with its waste disposal and sanitation. It's a constant uphill battle. The Spanish attitude towards waste and especially public property goes like this: 'It's not mine so I'm not going to take care of it. Someone else will.' Sounds pretty pedestrian as it is but I must stress that this uncaring, even actively disdainful mindset is pervasive. A little thing like dog poop would normally be no cause for comment. But here you can literally walk a block and see droppings two or three times. You have to actively and diligently avoid it on the sidewalks if you are traveling any sort of distance. We were told there is a 200E fine for letting your dog poop and not cleaning up after it. But nobody ever--ever-- gets ticketed for it. As my international relations teacher has put it, "In the States you're actually a very law-abiding people. You know the law and you know the consequences. Here nobody knows the law, and nobody knows what would happen if you broke it." He related the story of two former ICS students who had a typical interaction with the "police" in Seville. Returning through the park late one night they were assaulted by a group of young Spaniards who threw bottles and bricks at them. The two began to run from the incoming projectiles, to their credit laughing at the absurdity of the spectacle given the aim of the inebriated Spaniards. But when the group continued to pursue and harass them they exited the park quickly, only to find a cop car parked right outside the gate, two policemen sitting in it smoking. They yelled at the officers for help. Upon assessment of the situation the officers threw their cigs out the windows, slammed their doors, fired up their siren and sped away. Returning to the issue of trash, it is worth noting that the attitude does not simply exist in Seville. During our stay in Segura de Leon I saw constant evidence of the same sort of thing, epitomized by the typical method of 'disposing' of empty beer bottles: find the nearest windowsill at chest level, reach through the ubiquitous iron bars and set the bottle on the sill. Walk away. Or, if one happened to be feeling particularly energetic, one might make the effort to find the nearest abandoned entryway or domicile with a 'for sale' sign on it and huck the bottle in through the window bars. I don't know how anyone ever manages to turn a place over around here. The "Se Alquila" signs are like a magnet for broken beer bottles, paper, cigarette buts, needles, dog poop, you name it.
Continuing in this vein, I mentioned that there are iron bars on the windows right? We're not talking the windows at street level. No no, literally every single possible point of entrance on any building has these bars over it. As our professor put it, the concept of if it's not mine easily becomes 'if it's not yours' or more likely 'if it's not bolted down or locked up, then it's fair game'. He said during the first couple years of the ICS' existence they had trouble keeping the desks in the classrooms. Who would steal desks I don't know, but there you have it.
They have a huge problem with alcohol among the youth. Part of this can be attributed to the horrendous lack of jobs for the 18-29 demographic. Statistics on unemployment for this age group put it at the 25-30% mark. This issue extends below the 18 year-olds as well though. It is fairly easy for a group of young teenagers to acquire what's know as the "get smashed quick" pack: Two liters of Coke, a liter of vodka or whiskey, plastic cups and ice. They come pre-packaged at some convenience stores. Many, many parents seem to care less about what their teens are doing out at night. It's kind of jarring to see 13,14,15 year-old girls roaming the streets, clearly inebriated and just as done up as the adults at 2 or 3 or 5 in the morning. This kind of thing isn't only an issue here in Spain though. Teenage drinking in the States is a pretty well-documented issue.
Despite their history, (and God what a history it is. Spain has receded from true international importance in the last several hundred years but from approx. 700 AD until the end of the imperial expansion era it was THE place to be. Europe, the Middle East, and Africa all being meshed together. Incredible) Spaniards are incredible xenophobic. Not racist per se, or not racist so simply understood. An example: the Muslim community of Seville wanted to purchase land near the river in order to build a community center. Not a mosque mind you but a religious and cultural center for the benefit of the Muslim community. In a situation reminiscent of the whole NY Ground Zero Mosque saga, the Seville community reacted in vehement opposition to this proposed construction. Lacking any true legal precedent for denying the purchase or construction, a group of Sevillians snuck out to the proposed site and proceeded to spread liberal amounts of pigs blood about. Their rationale being that the Muslims wouldn't want to purchase or construct anything on a site desecrated by the blood of an unholy animal. They were right. Now, this is a secondhand story I am relating to you. I haven't looked for any documentation on it, but it just sounds crazy enough to be entirely true. There is no Muslim community center nor was the land ever purchased.
Now none of this is intended to say that Spaniards are dirty or thieves either one. I merely want to point out a few ticks of this society which seem....... not quite so good. I have been doing some heavy criticizing this week I know. tomorrow I promise to relate some more upbeat events. We traveled to a famous winery and the southern city of Cadiz today and I have some pictures.
The trash. I understand that any major city in the world is going to struggle with its waste disposal and sanitation. It's a constant uphill battle. The Spanish attitude towards waste and especially public property goes like this: 'It's not mine so I'm not going to take care of it. Someone else will.' Sounds pretty pedestrian as it is but I must stress that this uncaring, even actively disdainful mindset is pervasive. A little thing like dog poop would normally be no cause for comment. But here you can literally walk a block and see droppings two or three times. You have to actively and diligently avoid it on the sidewalks if you are traveling any sort of distance. We were told there is a 200E fine for letting your dog poop and not cleaning up after it. But nobody ever--ever-- gets ticketed for it. As my international relations teacher has put it, "In the States you're actually a very law-abiding people. You know the law and you know the consequences. Here nobody knows the law, and nobody knows what would happen if you broke it." He related the story of two former ICS students who had a typical interaction with the "police" in Seville. Returning through the park late one night they were assaulted by a group of young Spaniards who threw bottles and bricks at them. The two began to run from the incoming projectiles, to their credit laughing at the absurdity of the spectacle given the aim of the inebriated Spaniards. But when the group continued to pursue and harass them they exited the park quickly, only to find a cop car parked right outside the gate, two policemen sitting in it smoking. They yelled at the officers for help. Upon assessment of the situation the officers threw their cigs out the windows, slammed their doors, fired up their siren and sped away. Returning to the issue of trash, it is worth noting that the attitude does not simply exist in Seville. During our stay in Segura de Leon I saw constant evidence of the same sort of thing, epitomized by the typical method of 'disposing' of empty beer bottles: find the nearest windowsill at chest level, reach through the ubiquitous iron bars and set the bottle on the sill. Walk away. Or, if one happened to be feeling particularly energetic, one might make the effort to find the nearest abandoned entryway or domicile with a 'for sale' sign on it and huck the bottle in through the window bars. I don't know how anyone ever manages to turn a place over around here. The "Se Alquila" signs are like a magnet for broken beer bottles, paper, cigarette buts, needles, dog poop, you name it.
Continuing in this vein, I mentioned that there are iron bars on the windows right? We're not talking the windows at street level. No no, literally every single possible point of entrance on any building has these bars over it. As our professor put it, the concept of if it's not mine easily becomes 'if it's not yours' or more likely 'if it's not bolted down or locked up, then it's fair game'. He said during the first couple years of the ICS' existence they had trouble keeping the desks in the classrooms. Who would steal desks I don't know, but there you have it.
They have a huge problem with alcohol among the youth. Part of this can be attributed to the horrendous lack of jobs for the 18-29 demographic. Statistics on unemployment for this age group put it at the 25-30% mark. This issue extends below the 18 year-olds as well though. It is fairly easy for a group of young teenagers to acquire what's know as the "get smashed quick" pack: Two liters of Coke, a liter of vodka or whiskey, plastic cups and ice. They come pre-packaged at some convenience stores. Many, many parents seem to care less about what their teens are doing out at night. It's kind of jarring to see 13,14,15 year-old girls roaming the streets, clearly inebriated and just as done up as the adults at 2 or 3 or 5 in the morning. This kind of thing isn't only an issue here in Spain though. Teenage drinking in the States is a pretty well-documented issue.
Despite their history, (and God what a history it is. Spain has receded from true international importance in the last several hundred years but from approx. 700 AD until the end of the imperial expansion era it was THE place to be. Europe, the Middle East, and Africa all being meshed together. Incredible) Spaniards are incredible xenophobic. Not racist per se, or not racist so simply understood. An example: the Muslim community of Seville wanted to purchase land near the river in order to build a community center. Not a mosque mind you but a religious and cultural center for the benefit of the Muslim community. In a situation reminiscent of the whole NY Ground Zero Mosque saga, the Seville community reacted in vehement opposition to this proposed construction. Lacking any true legal precedent for denying the purchase or construction, a group of Sevillians snuck out to the proposed site and proceeded to spread liberal amounts of pigs blood about. Their rationale being that the Muslims wouldn't want to purchase or construct anything on a site desecrated by the blood of an unholy animal. They were right. Now, this is a secondhand story I am relating to you. I haven't looked for any documentation on it, but it just sounds crazy enough to be entirely true. There is no Muslim community center nor was the land ever purchased.
Now none of this is intended to say that Spaniards are dirty or thieves either one. I merely want to point out a few ticks of this society which seem....... not quite so good. I have been doing some heavy criticizing this week I know. tomorrow I promise to relate some more upbeat events. We traveled to a famous winery and the southern city of Cadiz today and I have some pictures.
Monday, September 19, 2011
A weekend worth remembering.....briefly
Sorry I got this one out so late. I spent most of the evening last night putting it together only to have the internet crap out on me.
Oy. I cannot remember the last time something was oversold so heavily to me. I am literally racking my brain for another incident like what occurred this weekend and I can't come up with anything. All week Eddie and I were so stoked to go to the mountains and run with the bulls, stuff of legends, bragging rights, an especially Spanish custom of daring and bravado. Daring and bravado my left ass cheek. Excuse the language in the post, it's not going to get much better because I'm still slightly heated although I promise to do my journalistic best to present the events as they were, positive and negatives given equal weight etc. Let's start with what was decidedly awesome about the weekend
The animals--This tradition of running these animals up the main street into the plaza just feels old. It is almost akin to the ceremonial native american dances one can take in at certain times in New Mexico. The caballeros--cowboys--are decked out in this distinctly Spanish attire and their horses are huge. We're talking their chests were higher than the top of my head. Powerful animals, well trained and ridden with the skill and grace that comes from years out in the campo--countryside. Here are photos of the Caballeros and el campo
Oy. I cannot remember the last time something was oversold so heavily to me. I am literally racking my brain for another incident like what occurred this weekend and I can't come up with anything. All week Eddie and I were so stoked to go to the mountains and run with the bulls, stuff of legends, bragging rights, an especially Spanish custom of daring and bravado. Daring and bravado my left ass cheek. Excuse the language in the post, it's not going to get much better because I'm still slightly heated although I promise to do my journalistic best to present the events as they were, positive and negatives given equal weight etc. Let's start with what was decidedly awesome about the weekend
The animals--This tradition of running these animals up the main street into the plaza just feels old. It is almost akin to the ceremonial native american dances one can take in at certain times in New Mexico. The caballeros--cowboys--are decked out in this distinctly Spanish attire and their horses are huge. We're talking their chests were higher than the top of my head. Powerful animals, well trained and ridden with the skill and grace that comes from years out in the campo--countryside. Here are photos of the Caballeros and el campo
Much like in Pamplona or anywhere else they move the animals right up the principal street of the village. All the intersections have large swinging wooden gates that get closed when the animals approach and every window is at least barred, if not boarded as well especially at ground level.
The "mountains". More hills and rolling little mountains. The trees in rows are olive trees; Spain is the largest exporter of Olive oil in all of Europe, far surpassing Greece, or so I'm told. It is one of their few true industries.
So anyways they run them into the plaza, which is roughly the size of a baseball infield, like this:
Now one of the coolest aspects of the whole deal was the Gladiator-esque "seating" or viewing areas around the arena. They are just wooden boards thrown across the poles you can see there and lashed together with rope. When the bulls charge you the people around the edges disappear like bugs scrambling into every available crack. That's for old people and women. The younger guys run until they find a pole and then jump up and grab onto it while the bull passes underneath. Doing so is incredibly satisfying especially if you can feel the bull right behind you and then you just manage to get up above the horns. Man do they ever have some wicked horns. So Eddie and I did that for maybe an hour and a half, and then what they do is they let the bulls out one by one to run back down the main street and out into the fields again. So once we got tired of running around with all these people pushing and panicking along the sides of the arena, we made sure to pick a particularly feisty animal then waited just outside the arena until they herded it out and then got it attention and raced the half mile downhill with it just behind us. Nobody in the village does that, they all just escape out of the street and watch the animal pass so we were being yelled at by the locals who thought it an unnecessary risk. Typically american. All in all, an exhilarating couple of hours during which we were only in serious physical danger several dozen times.I commented on the bravado because once I got feel for the whole deal I realized the only true danger lay in the possibility that someone else would do something stupid in their panic and screw you over, or if you'd had too much to drink and didn't give the animals enough credit. By the time the third or fourth animal was brought out I was waiting just outside the poles long past when everybody else scrambled for their hiding places. Reme's brother was yelling at me incessantly to get behind something. I think he was just genuinely worried for my safety, but it bugged me. You cower behind your wooden board while this animal runs past 15 feet away from you. Ridiculous. Walking across the street in this country is more dangerous. To their credit there were several younger guys who were really going at it, racing past the bulls and just avoiding their horns etc. One guy waited for a bull to full on charge him, then timed a jump perfectly over the animal just as it lowered its horns. That was epic.
Here are some photos of the countryside, the village, its churches and the castle. The castle especially was a terrible disappointment. I just wanted to walk in and feel some history you know? The moors or the Visigoths before them probably built this castle over a thousand years ago in order to have the best possible view over the countryside etc. etc. Inside, it's a goddamn restaurant! An expensive one too. AND it costs a Euro if you want to climb up on its one wall.
So the three hours of bull activity were very worthwhile. The rest was just painful. Eddie and I were abysmally bored. After being introduced to all that Sevilla has to offer and a great new group of friends we were just listless all weekend. To make matters worse, the people in the mountains are much less used to foreigners, especially black people. They all stared at Eddie all the time and it made him very uncomfortable, and it was hardly ever curious staring or friendly inquisitiveness. Long story short we really felt we missed out on a weekend that could have been used to go to the beach or attend one of our city visits or really anything except sitting, bored out of our skulls 8-10 hours a day. Oh and here is the absolute kicker: Reme dropped two grenades on us the second night. I will diverge here for a moment to explain to the 40 plus crowd the concept of a 'grenade'.
Two years ago a social phenomenon in the form of programming on MTV know as "The Jersey Shore" took off. It is, without a doubt, one the most useless shows to ever exist. If you haven't heard of it, good. You're lucky. Remain blissfully ignorant. Some terms from the show have come into common everyday usage, especially among my generation. In this case the term is entirely accurate, appropriate, and slightly hilarious. Any girl who is just disgusting, as in overweight, ugly, terrible personality, annoying etc. but who, for some reason, has attractive friends she is hanging out with is a grenade. She earns this title because if one of your buddies wants to get with one of the attractive girls, somebody has to jump on the grenade and make the ultimate sacrifice for the team. A good wingman will occasionally jump on the grenade for a buddy, in the understanding that next time the favor will be returned in kind. So now that you have the basic concept, imagine our frustration when, at 12:30 AM Sunday morning, Reme comes back into the apartment where Eddie and I have been winding down and shooting the shit for half an hour with two grade A grenades. They were not nice, they were not fun or funny, nor were they entertaining. All they did was offer us a free drink before dragging us back to the plaza, now packed with drunk townspeople, every other one of them smoking up a storm. We didn't go to dance, and we didn't go to meet anybody. We stood around like sheep, and people continued to stare at Eddie. It was just an awful situation all around. Reme meant well, i know she did, and it would've been comical if it wasn't so uncomfortable and hadn't just put the cherry on top of the suck-sunday that was our weekend.
Now to be fair, this festival is a big deal for our family, and even Reme and Juan Antonio were out late, until like 4 both nights. They know a lot of people in the village, and I was talking to Reme and she said she especially loves coming up because she doesn't have to constantly worry about Pablo. They know all his friends up there and all the parents so it's very stress-free for them and they can kick back a little, drink with friends and talk. For those reasons and just out of a sense of gratitude for the opportunity Eddie and I made absolutely sure to keep our attitudes to ourselves and to be as kind and excited as possible. I know I won't forget the bulls, or the couple of guys who showed us how and when to run from them and where to hide; I won't forget the view of the countryside from the balcony of the apartment, especially at about 7 45 AM on Saturday when I got up early to see the sun rise, a deep, dark reddish color in the haze to the east, rapidly climbing and beginning its relentless assault on central Spain. Even that won't remain untainted for me though. I told Reme about it while two of her nieces were with us in the kitchen later in the day and I described it as best I could in Spanish. Reme got it, but the oldest niece asked me what time I got up.
7:15
(in spanish)What? Why in the world would you do that? That's stupid.
Well I went to bed at 12:30 because I was tired and didn't feel like drinking.
Didn't feel like drinking? That's stupid. What a boring night.
Yeah, I went to sleep early, got up early, saw the sunrise, ate breakfast, prayed for half an hour, did pushups, sat in the sun and enjoyed the serenity of the countryside and basked in the luxury of the cool mountain breeze,read for three hours, half of it schoolwork and half of it research for my thesis and an excellent book on Pat Tillman (thanks grandma) and his story. I did all of this before you managed to drag your sorry, hungover ass out of bed at 1 in the afternoon. Oh, and what's the BEST part about all of that? Yup, you're going to do the exact same thing all over again the next day.
I do love this place but I'm a little bit.........American, I think. It's easier to see when you get to compare yourself and others to Europeans. Sometimes it's not a fun thing to see. I have been praising the experience nonstop, but I promise later this week to compile something on what is not just different but the worse parts of Spain, Spanish culture etc. There are some serious problems which are only partially reflected by their current economic woes.
So anyways they run them into the plaza, which is roughly the size of a baseball infield, like this:
So the three hours of bull activity were very worthwhile. The rest was just painful. Eddie and I were abysmally bored. After being introduced to all that Sevilla has to offer and a great new group of friends we were just listless all weekend. To make matters worse, the people in the mountains are much less used to foreigners, especially black people. They all stared at Eddie all the time and it made him very uncomfortable, and it was hardly ever curious staring or friendly inquisitiveness. Long story short we really felt we missed out on a weekend that could have been used to go to the beach or attend one of our city visits or really anything except sitting, bored out of our skulls 8-10 hours a day. Oh and here is the absolute kicker: Reme dropped two grenades on us the second night. I will diverge here for a moment to explain to the 40 plus crowd the concept of a 'grenade'.
Two years ago a social phenomenon in the form of programming on MTV know as "The Jersey Shore" took off. It is, without a doubt, one the most useless shows to ever exist. If you haven't heard of it, good. You're lucky. Remain blissfully ignorant. Some terms from the show have come into common everyday usage, especially among my generation. In this case the term is entirely accurate, appropriate, and slightly hilarious. Any girl who is just disgusting, as in overweight, ugly, terrible personality, annoying etc. but who, for some reason, has attractive friends she is hanging out with is a grenade. She earns this title because if one of your buddies wants to get with one of the attractive girls, somebody has to jump on the grenade and make the ultimate sacrifice for the team. A good wingman will occasionally jump on the grenade for a buddy, in the understanding that next time the favor will be returned in kind. So now that you have the basic concept, imagine our frustration when, at 12:30 AM Sunday morning, Reme comes back into the apartment where Eddie and I have been winding down and shooting the shit for half an hour with two grade A grenades. They were not nice, they were not fun or funny, nor were they entertaining. All they did was offer us a free drink before dragging us back to the plaza, now packed with drunk townspeople, every other one of them smoking up a storm. We didn't go to dance, and we didn't go to meet anybody. We stood around like sheep, and people continued to stare at Eddie. It was just an awful situation all around. Reme meant well, i know she did, and it would've been comical if it wasn't so uncomfortable and hadn't just put the cherry on top of the suck-sunday that was our weekend.
Now to be fair, this festival is a big deal for our family, and even Reme and Juan Antonio were out late, until like 4 both nights. They know a lot of people in the village, and I was talking to Reme and she said she especially loves coming up because she doesn't have to constantly worry about Pablo. They know all his friends up there and all the parents so it's very stress-free for them and they can kick back a little, drink with friends and talk. For those reasons and just out of a sense of gratitude for the opportunity Eddie and I made absolutely sure to keep our attitudes to ourselves and to be as kind and excited as possible. I know I won't forget the bulls, or the couple of guys who showed us how and when to run from them and where to hide; I won't forget the view of the countryside from the balcony of the apartment, especially at about 7 45 AM on Saturday when I got up early to see the sun rise, a deep, dark reddish color in the haze to the east, rapidly climbing and beginning its relentless assault on central Spain. Even that won't remain untainted for me though. I told Reme about it while two of her nieces were with us in the kitchen later in the day and I described it as best I could in Spanish. Reme got it, but the oldest niece asked me what time I got up.
7:15
(in spanish)What? Why in the world would you do that? That's stupid.
Well I went to bed at 12:30 because I was tired and didn't feel like drinking.
Didn't feel like drinking? That's stupid. What a boring night.
Yeah, I went to sleep early, got up early, saw the sunrise, ate breakfast, prayed for half an hour, did pushups, sat in the sun and enjoyed the serenity of the countryside and basked in the luxury of the cool mountain breeze,read for three hours, half of it schoolwork and half of it research for my thesis and an excellent book on Pat Tillman (thanks grandma) and his story. I did all of this before you managed to drag your sorry, hungover ass out of bed at 1 in the afternoon. Oh, and what's the BEST part about all of that? Yup, you're going to do the exact same thing all over again the next day.
I do love this place but I'm a little bit.........American, I think. It's easier to see when you get to compare yourself and others to Europeans. Sometimes it's not a fun thing to see. I have been praising the experience nonstop, but I promise later this week to compile something on what is not just different but the worse parts of Spain, Spanish culture etc. There are some serious problems which are only partially reflected by their current economic woes.
Funny Stuff
I'm going to keep a running post on the funniest stuff that has happened. Cultural misunderstandings, the family or mostly Reme yelling at us, and above all Eddie. Eddie and I tend to feed off each other, and he's a veritable fountain of hilarity most days. In no particular order (I'm only going to leave out the most profane stuff so some of this will reflect our age, gender, and may be slightly offensive. I reserve the right to omit context. Enjoy):
- "Yeah man. That's why you absolutely have to dry hump naked."--Eddie Lipsey everybody.
- Eddie walks into the room where I'm sitting on my computer in the dark. "Hey man, can I turn the light on?" "Nah I like it like this." "Look man, Im black and I'm about to Skype. You know where this is going."
- Eddie and I are discussing wearing shoes because he's saying he doesn't like it and realistically it's too hot to have shoes on in the apartment most of the time. I commented that I feel naked shoeless because I always think 'what if I have to run somewhere?' Eddie responds: "I run faster barefoot. I think it's just a slave thing."
- We're sitting in Spanish, going over homework exercises and Eddie says "Man I am screwed." Our ancient old spanish teacher who is an awesome lady just gave him the death stare because we're not supposed to talk in English, so he turns around and goes "help me out man." "'estoy chingado' say that." Eddie dutifully repeats it loudly as I break down into a giggle fit. Estoy chingado=I'm fucked. The teacher got awfully stern with poor Eddie after that. He'll get me back I'm sure.
- Last night I got yelled at twice during dinner for eating salchicha improperly. Talk about cultural differences. Salchicha is just like salami roughly and I was cutting it with a fork. Reme goes "oy, Silas no. No haces esto. Usa esto" and hands me a knife to cut with. It's freaking salami and the fork was just fine but whatever. So she leaves the room to do something and a minute later I start cutting with the knife, at which point Pablo and Juan Antonio lay into me with "AY, Silas, que estas haciendo? Esto se come con sus manos" 'No no, not like that. You eat it with your hands.' Whatever.
- Last thing I can remember right this moment is how last night after everybody got back from exercising in the park--Eddie and I running, Reme and Juan Antonio walking--I was first tto shower. Got it done in like 10 minutes and, typical of me, left the light on. Mentally I assumed someone would be right in behind me what with everyone just finishing up working out. The door shut on its own. An hour later when we all sat down for dinner Reme lays into me about taking so much time in the bathroom? I didn't get it. 10 minutes is too much? This isn't New guinea or something for God's sake. Turns out with the light on and door closed they assumed I was in there for an hour. Never knocked. Never yelled to see if it was occupied. Never stopped to think "well he never takes that long, never has in his time here". No. Just yelling about the light and keeping the bathroom occupied for an hour. Ridiculous.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Quickly now
I'll be out until at least Sunday, if not Monday or Tuesday. Lo siento. We're heading north of the city into the mountains to a small cottage our host family has in a town called Segura de Leon. Apparently they've had a religious festival of sorts running since Monday and we're heading up to enjoy the tail end of it. Speaking of tails, and horns, Eddie and I are going to run with the bulls as part of the festival. We'll only do it if I think the setup isn't too sketchy or the street too tight or the other people too slow. They say you don't really have to worry about the bulls, it's the other participants that will royally screw you over. In all honesty, I'm dead set on doing it but if something tells me it's not a good idea I promise to do my best to listen. But I'll be damned if I let something like this slip away because of fear of injury. I feel I might as well sit at home on a couch if that's how I look at things. As someone I can't remember once said, "I'd rather be ashes than dust". I also promise to get tons of pictures which I haven't been doing the best job of so far. Have a wonderful weekend. Much love goes out to my family and friends following me along in this adventure. You are the strong foundation which allows me to persist when the winds and waves are aligned against me.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Reflections on an unprecedented week
I really cannot wrap my mind around the fact I've been here one week. One week ago I was sleeping on the floor of the domestic terminal in Madrid. A week ago I was alternately sleep deprived and riding waves of adrenaline with every new experience. One week ago I thought my spanish was shaky at best, but you should hear my roommate butcher everything he tries to say. It's hilarious, but the key is to keep trying to communicate. No matter who you're talking to. I wasn't sure what to expect, but nothing like this. Interesting classes, a fairly easy schedule, opportunities for travel and exploration around every corner. I have class every day at 9, so I'm up at 7 to start the day right with my two P's, Pushups and Prayer. Any new challenge can and will be met by God, and I have never felt out of His touch or reach throughout this week.
There are several people, girls especially, who are struggling with the homesickness. I'm unsympathetic. My school, minus the Ashbrook part, pales in comparison to what I've found here. This week felt like a new life, not just a new chapter or a new leaf, but something else. Something entirely novel. The differences aren't unbearable. I can deal with being hungry as we adjust to eating times, I can deal with being slightly hot, I can deal with a different language. Just smile at everyone and keep exploring and learning, crash hard at night and get up early to do it all again. I'll be honest and say this isn't really outside my comfort zone, especially since after some organizing and research I've got a gym membership at a place that's very close and very nice. I did, however, try to purchase some peanut butter today to eat after workouts because our host family receives enough in stipends to feed us three time a day only. Extra snacking or post-workout consumption is prohibited. Imagine the smallest container of peanut butter you can, the tiniest morsel, which might possibly contain 8-10 scoops of deliciousness. Now imagine that it costs 3 euros and 15 freaking cents. That's upwards of 4$. I know for a fact I can buy a vat of peanut butter at walmart for 3$ or so. Then again, walmart is the epitome of American-ness: they do supersize and cheap very well, neither of which are valued concepts here. I like it. You keep your ridiculously expensive peanut butter. Don't ever let walmart into your country.
In short, I'll never forget this first week. Too many new things, new friends, and experiences you can't just pay for. Add all of that to a beautiful city, alive, vibrant, and passionate, it's history stretching back further than ancient Rome. I hope and pray that each week will seem to take as long, each day be as challenging and educational. December better never come.
There are several people, girls especially, who are struggling with the homesickness. I'm unsympathetic. My school, minus the Ashbrook part, pales in comparison to what I've found here. This week felt like a new life, not just a new chapter or a new leaf, but something else. Something entirely novel. The differences aren't unbearable. I can deal with being hungry as we adjust to eating times, I can deal with being slightly hot, I can deal with a different language. Just smile at everyone and keep exploring and learning, crash hard at night and get up early to do it all again. I'll be honest and say this isn't really outside my comfort zone, especially since after some organizing and research I've got a gym membership at a place that's very close and very nice. I did, however, try to purchase some peanut butter today to eat after workouts because our host family receives enough in stipends to feed us three time a day only. Extra snacking or post-workout consumption is prohibited. Imagine the smallest container of peanut butter you can, the tiniest morsel, which might possibly contain 8-10 scoops of deliciousness. Now imagine that it costs 3 euros and 15 freaking cents. That's upwards of 4$. I know for a fact I can buy a vat of peanut butter at walmart for 3$ or so. Then again, walmart is the epitome of American-ness: they do supersize and cheap very well, neither of which are valued concepts here. I like it. You keep your ridiculously expensive peanut butter. Don't ever let walmart into your country.
In short, I'll never forget this first week. Too many new things, new friends, and experiences you can't just pay for. Add all of that to a beautiful city, alive, vibrant, and passionate, it's history stretching back further than ancient Rome. I hope and pray that each week will seem to take as long, each day be as challenging and educational. December better never come.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Today I thought some pictures would be nice. Tomorrow I'll do a reflection after one week (one week! only).
Monday, September 12, 2011
Classes
Classes started this morning, finally. I get the feeling they will be mostly as hard as I want to make them, which is to say that even with 15 hours it's probably going to be a cake semester schoolwork-wise. That's the whole point though. All three of my professors this morning talked about Sevilla and what we think and what we've been doing, and two of them told us to talk to them about traveling and how to do it cheaply and well. Our International relations teacher, who is scottish to the core and has the coolest sounding accent this side of Jason Statham, told us that if once or twice during the semester the ticket back was like a hundred euros cheaper on Monday morning rather than Sunday night....ehhhh. That's what we're here for too so as long as we didn't abuse it. Books are going to be like 40 euro for the enitre semester. So there's something they do better over here.
Here are the things that a very different:
Here are the things that a very different:
- Food. I've eaten so much bread. Fresh bread. But so, so much of it. And today Eddie and I downed a bowl of cereal before heading to school, and we didn't eat again until 2:30 this afternoon with the family. Granted it was the largest meal of the day, but by that point I had progressed past the state of active painful hunger and on to passive, accepted hunger. My stomach must be adjusting and maybe even shrinking because I thought, "God I'm so hungry I'll definitely have seconds." I couldn't finish a second plate. Que raro no?
- Staying in the food category, the milk here isn't pasteurized, or if it is it's a different process. The milk is sweet, not even semi-sweet but noticeably sweet, and Reme keeps five or so containers in reserve in the pantry. The American mind immediately says "no way, they would go bad." Obviously not. I'm still trying to figure it out, maybe look it up on the internet or something because those things stay down there for days, then when an old one runs out we put them in the fridge and they're good to go once cold. Very strange.
- Everything--and I mean everything--is doused in olive oil. The bread is cooked in it, the hamburgers are cooked in it, the salads are swimming in it and on and on. It's actually very tasty and I think fairly healthy.
- Sleeping. I'm not really adjusted yet, but somehow the whole siesta thing makes perfect sense when you're out the night before. Eddie and I have trouble getting to sleep before 2 or 3 AM anyways, despite the workouts I'm putting us through. It's just too damn hot without AC to do much else from 2-5 in the afternoon.
- Driving and traffic are nightmarish. Scooters all over the sidewalks, tiny tiny cars and still not enough space, no speed limits on any of the small or medium size roads etc. etc.
- Walking is fantastic. A 30 minute walk into downtown sounds like a gross venture to any suburban dweller but the city is beautiful, and if you have new friends to talk to the time passes very quickly.
- I don't think real Absinthe is legal or available in the states. Not so here. To quote the bartender, when asked for the strongest thing they've got, "try this. This shit will make you see leprechauns." I told Eddie this. He did not find it amusing, sputtering and cursing about seeing leprechauns. Hilarious. None for me thanks.
- In a large sense, the country has gone through a reversion or reaction maybe to being freed from dictatorship some thirty odd years ago. I saw many couples in the park yesterday while I was running, most of them sitting and talking or eating each other's faces whole. I also saw several going at it in broad daylight, and I was the only one staring or batting an eyelid. There were kids and families and ancianos (ancients, old folks) walking around and everything. Try doing that in broad daylight in a park in the states.
All in all I'm very glad to be "back in school", even if it is much less demanding than I'm probably used to. I could already tell today that December 16, seemingly far away, is actually breathing down my neck already, and that leaving a place so marvelous and novel to me to come back to an Ohio winter might just kill me.
P.S. This blogger allows me to modify existing blog posts so I may update some of them. I don't know if they will appear as such or have some sort of label saying they were edited. I won't do it very often.
P.S. This blogger allows me to modify existing blog posts so I may update some of them. I don't know if they will appear as such or have some sort of label saying they were edited. I won't do it very often.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Sunday
Ugh. Two nights in a row is really pushing it. At least this time we all walked and didn't have to spend tons of euros on cab fare. It's only a half an hour, maybe, to the city center. I wouldn't have been out till 5 again if I hadn't gotten lost heading back. I was thinking about a lot of things, and I was angry, so I intentionally put my head down and motored along without really tracking where I was. It took me almost two hours to get home. This city is crazy at night. You can be walking down an empty street, turn a corner, and suddenly there's a hundred people clustered around a cerveceria (bar) talking and laughing. And its also a cultural thing to park a car along one of these popular streets and bring a large bottle to drink out of. At first I thought there was tons and tons of bums. Then I noticed the bums were dressed just as nice as us, sometimes nicer. So they aren't really bums, just people drinking in little clusters on the side of the road. It's almost like the city sleeps, but only during the siesta in the middle of the afternoon when it's so hot that being out is pointless anyways.
Reme attacked Eddie and I today without warning. Just after noon when he and I were still waking up and talking about last night etc. she came storming in and starting going off about cleaning our room and how Sunday was our day to have the room cleaned. We were unaware Sunday was our day, and also unprepared for the tazmanian devil-like ferocity with which she proceeded to tear into our tiny living space. For half an hour Eddie and I just tried to keep our heads above water as she threw stuff away, reorganized, dusted, fired questions at us, re-reorganized, and on and on. When she is cooking or cleaning and you are nearby, Reme will keep up a constant stream of conversation, and in this case it was mostly about how dirty, disorganized, and generally abysmal our room was after some 3 days. It would've been funny if I wasn't scared. Juan Antonio, the dad of the family, stood outside the door and laughed at us while we tried to keep up and be helpful. As with all sudden and violent storms, this one passed abruptly. Suddenly our beds were made, everything put away and it was almost time for lunch. Next week I think we'll prepare ourselves a little better.
School starts tomorrow, gracias a dios. It seems like I went to classes once upon another lifetime. Oh and my roommate turned 19 last night. Very cool for him. I'm hoping I won't have to celebrate mine in any way here. I don't like the attention or the process of it.
Reme attacked Eddie and I today without warning. Just after noon when he and I were still waking up and talking about last night etc. she came storming in and starting going off about cleaning our room and how Sunday was our day to have the room cleaned. We were unaware Sunday was our day, and also unprepared for the tazmanian devil-like ferocity with which she proceeded to tear into our tiny living space. For half an hour Eddie and I just tried to keep our heads above water as she threw stuff away, reorganized, dusted, fired questions at us, re-reorganized, and on and on. When she is cooking or cleaning and you are nearby, Reme will keep up a constant stream of conversation, and in this case it was mostly about how dirty, disorganized, and generally abysmal our room was after some 3 days. It would've been funny if I wasn't scared. Juan Antonio, the dad of the family, stood outside the door and laughed at us while we tried to keep up and be helpful. As with all sudden and violent storms, this one passed abruptly. Suddenly our beds were made, everything put away and it was almost time for lunch. Next week I think we'll prepare ourselves a little better.
School starts tomorrow, gracias a dios. It seems like I went to classes once upon another lifetime. Oh and my roommate turned 19 last night. Very cool for him. I'm hoping I won't have to celebrate mine in any way here. I don't like the attention or the process of it.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
This is New
OK so Eddie and I got home last night....well not last night, this morning at 5 am. Then rolled out of bed at noon. As per the title, this is new for me. As in, I can't count the number times I've been out that late on any combination of hands or feet because it has never, ever happened. Some group that does travel here in Spain for international students sponsored a night out for us and several other international groups. Starting with an hour of free Sangria at a local bar in what would be equivalent to downtown Seville, they put on one heck of time. After about two hours our smaller group of ICS (International College of Seville) students, some twenty or so people, found some momentum and spilled out of the bar into the street where the collective agreement was 'it's time to find a discotec.' Enter the seemingly gracious and friendly Spaniard who yes, knows a fairly close disco, and yes will love to take us there. Everybody into 4 separate cabs and we're off. I rode with an awesome girl from Montana who was really having a good night, loud and bouncy and just plain fun, and with Mr. helpful but also pushy Spaniard. He comments on the way over that he knows the guy who owns the place and can get us all in free. Right. After he said it I took a harder look at him: slightly drunk, paunchy, maybe late 20's, sweat and (hopefully) beer stains on his ill-fitting black v-neck. This guy isn't getting us in anywhere. So inevitably we stand outside for twenty minutes while he bickers with the bouncers, and finally we decide to walk off and just ask some Spaniards to point us towards another place we could get into. Now here's a funny little tidbit: Spaniards, while they're friendly enough if you approach them and are proficient enough in your Spanish, do not like a bunch of drunk, loud Americans. Can't figure out why. Anyway, we walked about two miles following contradicting directions from three or four separate sources. After maybe an hour of walking we come upon our third club and lo and behold the travel group has moved here, across the river from the bar and we can get in for free, and two for one drinks! What luck. We spent another two hours or so there and it was awesome.
I really wanted to work on being open to things here, trying new stuff etc. Cousin Tad said, "If I have any advice it would just be try everything." He was certainly right. I've never had so much fun, and this group of American students seems like a great bunch of people. My housemom Reme asked me this morning if i had a heavy conscience about it and I said no, it was so much fun." Good, good" she said. "It's kind of like the peanut butter." I asked her the other day if there was anywhere I could purchase peanut butter. She got really serious and said, "Silas, you didn't come to Spain to eat American food did you? In three months, when you go home, the American food, the peanut butter, the gym, they'll all still be there waiting for you." Mom's always know.
I really wanted to work on being open to things here, trying new stuff etc. Cousin Tad said, "If I have any advice it would just be try everything." He was certainly right. I've never had so much fun, and this group of American students seems like a great bunch of people. My housemom Reme asked me this morning if i had a heavy conscience about it and I said no, it was so much fun." Good, good" she said. "It's kind of like the peanut butter." I asked her the other day if there was anywhere I could purchase peanut butter. She got really serious and said, "Silas, you didn't come to Spain to eat American food did you? In three months, when you go home, the American food, the peanut butter, the gym, they'll all still be there waiting for you." Mom's always know.
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Things I'll be watching
For those of you who aren't following European politics closely, here is an article that will give you a snapshot of the current happenings in Spanish politics: http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/politics/2011/09/08/spanish-senate-approves-constitutional-cap-on-deficit/
As it points out, elections are going to be held early this year according to Prime Minister Zapatero and his party's wish that reforms be enacted more quickly. I believe he and his party are pushing the elections up for two reasons: First, a genuine concern for the state of the Spanish economy, which is in shambles, and the sentiment of the public which is extremely unhappy with its governing body much like elsewhere in Europe. Second, despite not running for reelection, Zapatero and his party may believe that pushing through austerity measures and constitutional reforms like the one mentioned above right before the election cycle, combined with the fear and uncertainty rocking European and American markets, may take some of the wind out of the sails of the Populist Party which is currently leading the November polls. These are just some thoughts on the whole thing. I really lucked out, coming over during what will certainly be an important election cycle, both for Spain and for the rest of the European Union.
Finally, just a thought: I exchanged some cash for Euros two days ago, and for those of you who haven't handled any Euros, guess what image recurs on their bills..........not presidents or famous Europeans or anything like that. The recurring image is (I think) Roman aqueducts. Think about it.
As it points out, elections are going to be held early this year according to Prime Minister Zapatero and his party's wish that reforms be enacted more quickly. I believe he and his party are pushing the elections up for two reasons: First, a genuine concern for the state of the Spanish economy, which is in shambles, and the sentiment of the public which is extremely unhappy with its governing body much like elsewhere in Europe. Second, despite not running for reelection, Zapatero and his party may believe that pushing through austerity measures and constitutional reforms like the one mentioned above right before the election cycle, combined with the fear and uncertainty rocking European and American markets, may take some of the wind out of the sails of the Populist Party which is currently leading the November polls. These are just some thoughts on the whole thing. I really lucked out, coming over during what will certainly be an important election cycle, both for Spain and for the rest of the European Union.
Finally, just a thought: I exchanged some cash for Euros two days ago, and for those of you who haven't handled any Euros, guess what image recurs on their bills..........not presidents or famous Europeans or anything like that. The recurring image is (I think) Roman aqueducts. Think about it.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
The First Day
Finally, finally on the ground in Sevilla. The flight from DC to Madrid was only 7 hours, and as we deboarded the plane at 7:15 am local time, the sun was slowly burning red across the eastern sky; it felt sort of odd given I'd left DC at 5 PM local. Shortest night of my life, and I maybe slept an hour. My communication abilities were rusty, especially in the airport with foreign security breathing down my neck. After a few hours conversing with my house mother and her young boy Pablo I feel back up to speed.
These are both taken in the domestic terminal of the Madrid-Barajas airport. Their domestic terminal is about ten times as large as the Albuquerque airport, and there are no less than three other terminals.
It's hot, hotter than I expected. Edward (unexpected roommate, more on that in a second) and I walked for an hour and a half so that I could get my bearings and by the time I got back I had broken a sweat. It's not humid but the city feels like it is boiling, just like an other concrete jungle. It's no wonder they sleep the afternoon away. It's still comparable to the worst weeks of summer we had this year out here, and nothing moves from 2-5 PM. It's....eerie. Stores closed in the middle of the afternoon, traffic almost non-existent, the steady dripping on the sidewalks as hundreds and hundreds of AC units crank away against the heat. Don't worry though; the gym, Galisport, is open 7 AM on until 11. Gracias a Dios. Priorities and all. I believe it will cost me approximately 100 Euros for three months of use, or about 40$ a month more or less. Not a bad rate at all.
I misread the piece of my housing email that briefly mentioned I'd be sharing a double room. So I was outright surprised to find Edward and Pablo in the apartment waiting for me. Edward is a sophomore from Detroit, and he is really, really cool. I've lucked out twice on the random roommate process. Edward has been here since Saturday, incredibly, because his father's job was requiring the rest of the family to move to Brazil for 18 months.
This is our room. Big enough for two small beds and all our stuff barely. Poor Edward. This was taken at about 10 in the morning. He's been here almost a full week and still hasn't adjusted his sleep schedule.
He got to head north, into the mountains, with the family over the weekend. Apparently they own a small cabin? Something like a small cabin in a pueblo in the mountains about 45 miles north of the city proper. The mountains looked fairly majestic from the plane, but Pablo assured me they weren't "mountains mountains"--just rollers. Still, the climate and landscape aren't what I pictured. Landing on the outskirts of Madrid I could have sworn I was touching down in northern Arizona or New Mexico. The landscape is dry and mountainous, even this far south. Sevilla is located, or more likely it grew around, the confluence of two rivers, both fairly large. The countryside is a patchwork of dry, barren terrain mixed with agricultural plots. Anyways, mi familia me dijo--my family told me--that we would be heading back to the mountains next weekend for a festival. A running of the bulls festival. Yeah, just like the deal in Pamplona immortalized by Hemingway. I can't wait.
Our apartment is small, six rooms including the shared bathroom, but very nice. Marble floors, small kitchen, an outdoor patio that looks down on our street, almirante topete. It's relatively quiet, even now at eleven at night, the height of the Spanish day so to speak. The temperature has dropped to bearable levels and we just finished dinner. Another cultural adjustment to make: the two main meals of the day are a huge lunch around 1 and an equally huge dinner served anywhere from 9-10. As Edward so eloquently put it "Man. They don't snack. Ever. What are we supposed to eat during the day? There's no snacks in here." If I'm not mistaken, Edward and I are on our own for breakfast, and Reme, our housemother, will prepare the other two major meals of the day, and two meals in it's easy to tell she is an excellent cook. Tomorrow we have a completely free day to look through the city, workout, and later we will be attending a procession in honor of La Virgen, who is every bit as popular here as she is in Mexican culture and Catholicism in general.
All in all, I couldn't have asked for a better roommate or a better homestay family. I'm going to sleep like the dead tonight, and continue to explore the city tomorrow before orientation on Friday.
It's hot, hotter than I expected. Edward (unexpected roommate, more on that in a second) and I walked for an hour and a half so that I could get my bearings and by the time I got back I had broken a sweat. It's not humid but the city feels like it is boiling, just like an other concrete jungle. It's no wonder they sleep the afternoon away. It's still comparable to the worst weeks of summer we had this year out here, and nothing moves from 2-5 PM. It's....eerie. Stores closed in the middle of the afternoon, traffic almost non-existent, the steady dripping on the sidewalks as hundreds and hundreds of AC units crank away against the heat. Don't worry though; the gym, Galisport, is open 7 AM on until 11. Gracias a Dios. Priorities and all. I believe it will cost me approximately 100 Euros for three months of use, or about 40$ a month more or less. Not a bad rate at all.
I misread the piece of my housing email that briefly mentioned I'd be sharing a double room. So I was outright surprised to find Edward and Pablo in the apartment waiting for me. Edward is a sophomore from Detroit, and he is really, really cool. I've lucked out twice on the random roommate process. Edward has been here since Saturday, incredibly, because his father's job was requiring the rest of the family to move to Brazil for 18 months.
He got to head north, into the mountains, with the family over the weekend. Apparently they own a small cabin? Something like a small cabin in a pueblo in the mountains about 45 miles north of the city proper. The mountains looked fairly majestic from the plane, but Pablo assured me they weren't "mountains mountains"--just rollers. Still, the climate and landscape aren't what I pictured. Landing on the outskirts of Madrid I could have sworn I was touching down in northern Arizona or New Mexico. The landscape is dry and mountainous, even this far south. Sevilla is located, or more likely it grew around, the confluence of two rivers, both fairly large. The countryside is a patchwork of dry, barren terrain mixed with agricultural plots. Anyways, mi familia me dijo--my family told me--that we would be heading back to the mountains next weekend for a festival. A running of the bulls festival. Yeah, just like the deal in Pamplona immortalized by Hemingway. I can't wait.
Our apartment is small, six rooms including the shared bathroom, but very nice. Marble floors, small kitchen, an outdoor patio that looks down on our street, almirante topete. It's relatively quiet, even now at eleven at night, the height of the Spanish day so to speak. The temperature has dropped to bearable levels and we just finished dinner. Another cultural adjustment to make: the two main meals of the day are a huge lunch around 1 and an equally huge dinner served anywhere from 9-10. As Edward so eloquently put it "Man. They don't snack. Ever. What are we supposed to eat during the day? There's no snacks in here." If I'm not mistaken, Edward and I are on our own for breakfast, and Reme, our housemother, will prepare the other two major meals of the day, and two meals in it's easy to tell she is an excellent cook. Tomorrow we have a completely free day to look through the city, workout, and later we will be attending a procession in honor of La Virgen, who is every bit as popular here as she is in Mexican culture and Catholicism in general.
All in all, I couldn't have asked for a better roommate or a better homestay family. I'm going to sleep like the dead tonight, and continue to explore the city tomorrow before orientation on Friday.
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