Sunday, October 18, 2009

10:27 PM

Just a couple interesting things to note about Spain:

- It’s really hard to tell how old Spaniards are. Seriously. Doesn’t matter if they’re in their teens or in their 80s, it’s impossible to guess.

- They talk about food ALL the time. Now that my Spanish is better I can eavesdrop, and that’s the most popular topic of discussion.

- I know I’ve said it before, but mullets are really “in” here.

- I wish I loved anything as much as they love soccer. But actually.

- Spain loves to recycle and conserve. Everywhere there’s a trash can there are two separate bins for recycling. They take military showers so as to not use too much water. They shut off the lights whenever they leave a room.

- Oddly enough, Spain also loves bottled water. I don’t get it.

- Spaniards use Mopeds or Motorcycles just as much, if not more, than cars. What’s awesome about this is that very well dressed businessmen and women ride to work in their heels, their dress shoes, their nice suits, you name it. I aspire to that level of suaveness.

This is an OK representation, but here the woman drive. Sometimes the men are even on the back, and that's the most exciting.

- Yesterday at the gym I saw a man wearing baggy sweatpants that only went down to his mid calf and a skin-tight striped tank top. Unfortunately I looked for a similar picture on the internet just now, but couldn’t find one. I'm sure it exists, though.

October 17, 2009

11:35 AM

Dorm

P.S. Sorry there aren't many photos to accompany this yet, but I left my camera to upload my pictures in Paris, and it's currently in the hands of the European postal service, I hope.

Things are going well in Granada, but since I’ve returned from Paris a week ago, I cannot stop thinking about it. Maybe it’s that it was my first “European” trip, maybe it’s that I got to see friends I really missed, maybe it’s that it was my first getaway from my program, or maybe it was just that it was Paris. In any case, I adored it.

On Thursday night I got on the last bus to Malaga and stayed at a hostel for 10 euro (I love Europe). I shared a ten-bed room with 2 other men who, when I arrived at 11, were already sleeping. Don’t know what other peoples’ experiences are like with hostels, but I find them to be incredibly awkward. I was trying to tip-toe around and not wake them up but I kept smashing into things, which was really silent. The best part was that I had to make my own bed. I basically ended up sleeping in a “sheets burrito” so I wouldn’t have to turn on the light and noisily tuck my sheets in and everything. I do like burritos, though, so it was fine.

The next day I boarded my flight to Paris bright and early and watched the sun rise from the air. When I got to Paris the airport was massive, and for some reason I forgot that people in France speak French, not Spanish. I speak Spanish, not French. Luckily everyone there, although they get kinda pissed when you ask them if they do, speaks some English. Yay America! Nevertheless, I must have been looking particularly French that morning (after taking a two-hour bus ride, sleeping four hours, taking a two hour flight and wandering around the airport confusedly) because many people struck up conversations with me. My response for everyone was a motion with my hand that was very similar to the motion you would make to describe throwing up. It began with my hand sort of near my mouth and then kind of fanning out into the air accompanied by my saying “I’m sorry I don’t speak French” to which most people responded, “Oh, OK,” and walked away. All in all, a successful method. At one point on the metro during the weekend someone asked me something and I attempted a little “Desole, j’n’parle pas frances,” which sounded approximately like “J no, par pals frances.” The woman I said it to laughed, turned to her friend, and either said (in French, so I’m not sure), “Italians never speak French,” or, “Maybe it’s because we’re Italian.” Really I have no idea, I just am positive that she said something about Italians.

Carly and Bryn met me at the airport and even though I just saw Carly two weeks ago and Bryn at the end of the summer, it was wonderful to see them come around the corner to find me. We hopped on the metro after paying 8.50 for one ride and arrived half an hour later at their apartment, which, coincidentally, is on the same street as the Spanish Embassy. Spooky. They also happen to live about a four second walk from the Eiffel Tower, which is alright, I guess. I guess if I could live anywhere in the world I would accept living right next to the Eiffel Tower. We took a walk over and were bombarded by men trying to sell us one-euro key chains and other weird paraphernalia. Sometimes they get word that the cops are coming and all gather up their mini Eiffels and go sprinting in the same direction. I saw it once. It made my day.

The first day rounded out with a trip to a Fondue restaurant. This is not just any fondue, friends, this is wine in baby bottles, money taped to the walls, scary French waiters, tiny little dining room fondue. In other words, awesome fondue.

I’m still not sure how I feel about drinking nice white wine out of baby bottles with a little nipple, but it happened, so I went along with it. At the end of the meal we all felt nice and warm for our wine and cleansed from our cheese fondue facial. The pots sat in the middle of the table and the steam wafted up into all of our pores, especially Beckie’s. It made for a really spectacular feeling the next morning. We also went to see the Eiffel Tower sparkle that night, and watched a man spit fire, which was awesome and terrifying. Another man had a Turkish flag draped over his shoulders. He must have won a race and was taking his victory lap.

I got up early the next day to watch True Blood and eat French cereal (the same brands as the US but approximately 100% better, crunchier, tastier, awesomer) before anyone else got up. Eventually Bryn and I headed out to see the Notre Dame, and unfortunately upon getting off the metro walked the wrong direction and couldn’t find it before we had to leave for a bike ride in the park with their business school abroad. Our bike ride was fun and, as it turns out, there were two people there with Brookline connections (small world)! My first hint about their program director was that he was wearing green sweatpants with some Boston thing on them, a Celtics playoffs shirt from a LONG time ago, a Boston marathon windbreaker, and a New Bedford fishing association hat on. He fit in really well in Paris. He heard me talking about Brookline with one of the French students who has family there and who studied at Milton Academy for a year, and almost fell of his bike.

Apparently the director’s family lives on Chestnut Hill Ave, which, for those of you who don’t know, is about a five-minute walk from my house. It’s my neighborhood. I was blown away that not one, but two people there had family in my town. How weird.

That evening, after escaping early from the bike ride, stepping in some dog poop and buying some sweet boots, we all went out. Our night ended at a little café with a pitcher of wine, a café au lait, a chocolat chaud, and a té au lait. Actually, our night ended with a Banana Nutella crepe, which was heaven in my mouth, and on my hands, and my chin and a little on my pants, too. Oops. That’s when my love affair with crepes began.

On the last day we went to the Louvre, and got in free! Apparently because we are studying in Europe we’re considered European citizens between the ages of 18-25, which means we get into the Louvre free! We saw all the usual stuff, but didn’t get a single explanation because EVERYTHING in the Louvre is written in French, and nothing, with the exception of the signs telling you to “Keep your hands of the works of art,” is written in English. Luckily Bryn, with her several semesters of art history, was able to give us some valuable notes about several paintings and several styles of art. Yay for Bryn! When we left we asked an American if he could take our picture. Bad idea. It took forever, he wanted to take it from approximately 10 different angles, and then wanted to be in a picture. Boo.

Afterwards we headed to the Musee d’Orsay, which for me was arguably more fun. They have a huge collection of impressionist paintings, of which I found a favorite: Snow at Louveciennes painted by Alfred Sisley.

I don’t know what it was about this painting that I loved so much, but tears came to my eyes when I first saw it. When I’m a trillionaire I’ll own it. OR, if someone wants to buy me it, I’m sure it’s not THAT expensive. Outside the Musee d’Orsay are several sculptures of humungous, very real-looking safari animals (and a horse). I obviously took pictures of them. There was also a crazy man singing. Cities are awesome for so many different reasons.

Just before bed Amanda and I headed to the Eiffel tower to get a crepe, and I, mistaking someone speaking French for someone speaking Spanish, struck up a conversation. Amazingly, it was semi successful. The next day I got on the Metro alone at 745, and with only slight difficulty made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare. I love Granada, and it was a nice feeling to step off the bus here and feel like I was home, but I fell in love with Paris. I hope my life takes me there at some point.

October 12, 2009

5:58 PM

Location: It’s always the same

So, even though it’s mid-October, the summer is over, and the weather should be cooling off, it’s maybe hotter here than it was the third week of our stay. It’s awkward because we wake up in the morning to frigidness (about 15-18 degrees Celsius, which equals about mid 50s F for all you non-Europeans), but after two hours of class we step outside to a broiling sun. The other day I went on a walking adventure wearing my black jacket (I wear it everyday, it’s kind of awkward), some jeans and some sandals. After about 15 steps I was sweating profusely and had to take off my jacket. Two hours later, after walking around the entire city doing errands and eventually hiking up the mountain to our dorm, my backpack and jeans were damp. Yummy. I love the heat. In October.

I lost my train of thought at this point because I received a phone call from tbernie14 and we planned a trip together in a few weeks! I told her that in my blog I strive for hilarity. Anyway, it is now 3:18 PM on Tuesday, October 13.

Apparently here in Spain Tuesday the thirteenth is an unlucky day just like Friday the thirteenth for us. Who knew? The minute after our professor told us that I broke the clip off the pen that I was borrowing while sitting next to the kid I was borrowing it from. Very unlucky.

I went to Paris this past weekend and I have a ton to write about that, but I’ll give it its own post. For this entry I think I’ll dedicate it to lovely Andalucía. Last weekend (the one before this past one), we made a day trip to Córdoba to see the mosque that is still there from the Islamic era.

We had been learning about it in Art History class, and it was unbelievable to see it in person. It helped that our tour was led by Lupe ‘the great’ (that’s my nickname for her). She is the best professor that has ever graced this earth. I want her to adopt me.

The mosque is absolutely massive and has gone through five expansions.

Everything has its own little story and Lupe explained it like a pro. The best.

Weirdly, in the middle of this dark, mystical mosque is a really tall cathedral. It’s just plopped right in the middle. When the Christians conquered Córdoba they left the mosque, but made it a “Christian” Cathedral. So crazy to see.

After our trip to Córdoba we went to Medina Alzahara, the ancient runes of Abdrrahman III’s (mouthful) royal city. It was pretty awesome, but it’s dry to write about, and I have sweet pictures from the disposable camera I had to use. I love disposable cameras, by the way. Not.

On Saturday I had a Granada day and found an AWESOME Brazilian store. The guy made me juice, and it was really good. I love Brazilians. I also found out that my camera cannot be fixed. F. Sunday, though, was the best day of all. At 2:30 PM, packed lunch in hand, four friends and I met at the bus stop and took a day trip to the Sierra Nevada for a hike.

The bus ride up there was nauseating, to say the least, and when we finally arrived in Monachil (the town we were to start from), I wanted to boot everywhere. Gross. We walked a little ways through the town looking SUPER American and eventually reached the “trail head.”

I put that in quotation marks because there was barely an official sign. The sign pointed up the mountain and read “Los Cahorros.” There was no map, no visitor’s center, nothing. I think Sharon Levine would have had a heart attack. So we headed off into the mountains, cameras in hand ready for action. I took my broken camera with me and snapped some pretty cool blind pics, so enjoy those throughout this blog.

Some cool/weird things that we encountered along the way:

- A thin bridge on which only four people were permitted at a time. It wobbled.

- Way too many little kids running around the edge of this river.

- Fresh figs (higos) that I was too scared to eat, but that Lucas was not.

- A really cool ledge

- A scary rock wall that Miriam wanted to climb

- A man putting a lot of effort into getting a remote control truck to drive up a vertical rock wall. He was not successful.

- Lots of poop. Not surprising, considering it’s Granada and there’s poop everywhere. I’m pretty sure this was wild animal poop, though, which makes it more exciting.

- Rattle snakes. Well, not really, but we thought we heard some. I actually think it was a bush and the wind.

- The spikiest plants ever

- A snake skin.

- People from Finland.

All in all, a great hike.

At the end we headed back down into Monachil and had beers at a restaurant next to which, every few minutes, a man would set off really loud fireworks. He creepily stood there doing nothing and then would randomly pull a firework off the stand and ignite it. It didn’t even look cool, it just made a bang. He probably should have grown out of that phase of his life years before. Whatever.

Anyway, not too much to say here, but felt I had to update everyone on our cool hike. I felt very outdoorsy afterwards. I’m glad that outdoorsy is a real word.

An annotation: Sydney and I sometimes dance in our room.

Bullfight (Kinda graphic, sorry)

 

On Sunday afternoon, we attended a bullfight (with Carly!!!!). 

There were, I think, more American students there than Spanish spectators. Most Spaniards who attend bullfights are older people. Young people don’t really like going because bull fights (corridas, as they call them, and as I will refer to them, as I am slowly becoming Española) have become extremely controversial around these parts. I sort of thought everyone was making too big a deal out of it, and didn’t really understand why people protest such a cultural tradition. Then I went to one. Now I know. It was horrendous/awesome/terrifying/shocking/cool/awful/gruesome/traditional/oh my god. Let me try to give you a little view into the world of the bullfight (as if I really know something about it, which I do not).

 The whole thing starts with a huge bull running out into the middle of the ring. 

He looks confused and kind of pissed, and when the little team of ‘toreros,’ as they’re called, all come out, he runs towards their pink capes and gets to them just after they duck behind a little wooden fence. 

After they’ve done that for awhile, two horses come out dressed in an armor of wood or metal, and the toreros provoke the bull to charge the horse, at which point the guy on horseback proceeds to stab the bull’s back with a short, but very sharp little blade. After that guy continuously shoves this spear into the bull, the toreros distract the bull again, and the horse runs off. Next, they do this really scary thing where a guy, sans cape and sans sword, faces the bull head on, gets it to charge him, and stabs it in the back (now bleeding profusely from the injuries inflicted by the horseback rider) with two little objects. (When I say the bull is bleeding profusely, I kid you not. There is legitimately blood spurting out of the wound. Too graphic? Tough noogies). The two little stick things (I really know my vocab when it comes to bull fights) are about 2 feet long, and are usually multicolored. 

From where we were sitting I couldn’t tell what they were made of, and by the end of the bullfight you can’t even tell what color they were, because they are entirely soaked through with blood. They do this three times, and each time it’s terrifying. Just as the torero (brave?crazy? Your call) is about to be trampled, his teammates distract the bull (thank god for colorblindness) and save his little tush.  By the end of this part the bull should have stab wounds from the horseman and 6 little poles sticking out of his back. Now it’s time for the Top Gun matador. Again, I have no idea on the name, and most people actually call him Torero also, but I’m going to stick with Matador because it means killer, and that’s what he does. Anyway, he goes out into the middle with a red cloth and a sword, and, for about 10 minutes or so, provokes the bull, yells at it, and gets it to charge at his cape. 

After close calls, the crowd yells, “Olé!” Eventually the matador walks off to the side of the ring, leaving the bull in the middle looking confused, bloody and pissed, and gets his bigger sword. A few quick charges later the matador stands poised, sword in the air, and stabs the bull through the back.

 If done correctly the bull staggers, charges again, and then dies almost instantaneously. Out of the six we saw, that was only the case once. If it’s done incorrectly the sword sticks out of the bull’s back, he continues to charge at the team of toreros, and slowly bleeds out. After several agonizing minutes it trips, falls, coughs up blood, and then is stabbed in the back of the neck with a small sword to kill it once and for all. Everyone cheers, and the bull’s horns are tied to a slay that is dragged out of the circle by two horses, leaving a thick trail behind the bull’s carcass. That’s the standard.

The variations, however, are endless. They kill six bulls in a corrida, and so there are millions of moments during which someone can mess something up. At one point the matador tripped and the bull stomped all over him, leaving him with a bloody knee. With that bull he went on to be the one to stab all six little poles into its back, and to kill it with one swift blow to the back in the very end. He was the recipient of said bull’s ear for doing such a good job. He later killed another bull, and for the whole day, after being trampled early on, he wore a turnucate around his leg as the red spot near his knee got bigger and bigger. Yum. In another weird turn of events a different bull straight up just charged the wall and broke a panel of wood out. Not at all dangerous.

The people at the Corrida are a whole different area of fascination. First of all, for them, watching it is like watching a hockey game. It doesn’t really affect them at all, and they know all the rules and customs. When the Matador does a good job and kills the bull with one swift blow, they stand up and wave little white flags at him. When the bull almost tramples the torero, but doesn’t, they all yell, “Olé!.” Most of them seem a little bit like the people who go betting at the horse tracks. Some of them seem way too nice to be at these Corridas. All in all, not a normal crowd.

Some things I learned at the bullfight:

1. It is not customary to eat there (or anywhere other than a table, for that matter)
2. The bull’s ear is cut off and given to the Torero if he does a good job
3. Bulls are colorblind
4. Bulls are not that intelligent
5. Neither are people

 

All in all, I have some concluding comments:

1. After seeing the bullfight I agree with the protestors, it is a little barbaric. It’s almost like the people are taunting the bull, “You’re gonna die, you’re gonna die.” Kinda effed up. It would be a different ballgame if all parties involved knew the desired outcome.
2. I no longer want to eat red meat.
3. Spain needs subtitles. For everything. Including Bullfights.