The Emilio Castelar Dwellers

Well, no longer am I a resident of Calle Emilio Castelar #4 2d Alcala de Henares, Espana.
I have to tell you that I didn't expect to ever feel like living in Alcala could be home to me. I still wouldn't call this my home, because it is not where my family is or where my friends are, but I can tell you I did get very used to walking to same routes, and I did become so comfortable. I gained a love for the country and the people in just the short time I was there. I have never seen a culture like the Spanish. In fact I really haven't experienced much other culture than America. I did experience the occasional culture clash, but for the most part I tried to remain open to the cultural norms of the Spanish people. I still felt like I could be myself although being surrounded by Spaniards. Spaniard's almost always dress up, all the time. They always look nice, they wear nice clothes, they do their hair, they always wear make-up, and a scarf and boots almost always accompany a womans outfit. Ok so then comes me... I often throw on jeans, hair is usually in a pony tail, make-up is only on if I don't forget, and I would only wear a scarf if it was cold, and I don't own a pair of nice boots to wear, and am usually found in my Chacos. I think, as you can tell by the description, I was not very acceptable as a Spaniard in the way I dressed. I don't think the word granola even exists in the Spanish language. So I made some changes. I tried to always leave the house presentable, I remembered to put on mascara more often, and I actually bought 3 scarfs and wore them even when it wasn't freezing! The only thing I couldn't give up were the Chacos, sorry but I am to big of a fan, plus I have to keep my identity somehow! Anyway, I learned a lot from the Spainish. I will now put in a good word for the country and the people. Spain kind of gets a bad rap, but it shouldn't. First of all it has one of the most beautiful, diverse, landscapes of any country. It is like the US in it's diversity, only much smaller. There are beaches, mountains, plains, city, beautiful gardens, everything! The people are great. If one comes to Spain, expect to find many many viejos(old people). These people have about the most pride I have seen for Spain, especially their region. They are up for talking any time, and are always ready to teach you anything you need to know. The Spanish people are not warm and fuzzy, but if you show them you are interested in Spain, or in anything they have to say, and if you get that good Castellano accent down, they will respect you. People are so different everywhere, and it has been such an opportunity to be able to get to know some of the most unique, wonderful people in the world! Viva Espana!

Madrilena

I have officially lived in Spain for 73 days. Who would have ever thought? I am not sure what constitutes as a local, but tonight as I was writing in my journal, I have been reflecting on all the things that have been the norm for me these past 73 days.
1.Shopping at Carrefour, they have little rolling baskets that remind me of rolling backpacks. I have to put my backpack in a locker at the front, because I may try to smuggle some galletas. A word about galletas, spanish cookies, the digestives have been my staple.
2.Using public transportation (a big step up from the Aggie Shuttle)I have a monthly bus/train pass that has my picture and everything. I can walk most everywhere because of my amazing location, but I have learned the bus numbers to take to various destinations in Alcala.
3.Eating dinner at 9:30, usually it is lighter than lunch which is at about 2:30. The first month I died because I ate breakfast at 8:00 and the wait to eat lunch about killed me.
4.Eating strange, exotic food. Suckling pig, octopus, cow stomach, rabbit, blood sausage, and I eat this because "if it's is famous for the area you have to eat it!"
5. Giving kisses on each cheek to greet people, which by the way for Miss. I am not a touchy person at all, was really weird for me at first, but now I really like it. Plus when in Spain... you know the rest.
6. I know the latest Spanish celeb news from our favorite lunch program Corazon a Corazon. Everything from the hideous Chiki Chiki song, to Javier Bardem winning the Oscar, and then them talking about him winning it for weeks after.
Anyway that is probably good for now. Living in Spain is fabulous. Can't you tell?

A little word on art

I have loved the opportunity to visit some of the most famous art museums while I have been here in Spain. Every time you walk into an art museum you are subjecting yourself to a different viewpoint on life. Sometimes I will walk down a whole wall of art and not be too affected, othertimes there are things that catch my eye. Yesterday I visited the Thyssen Museum in Madrid. It specialized in Early impressionism all the way into Fauvism and Avant-Garde. This period of art is my favorite, so you can imagine what a fun experience it was for me. The first painting of the women on the hill was my favorite painting in the museum. I had never heard of the painter so I came home and did a little homework. His name is Josef Israels and he is a Dutch realist painter. He painted this in 1900. His other works were similar to this. He painted simple peasants or fisherman. I love this girl because I can relate to her. She is just up there looking out to sea and no one knows what she is thinking and no one needs to know what she is thinking, but we can tell she is just enjoying the moment.
The painting in the middle not only intrigued me because it is Degas, but because it is an example of irony in painting. It's title is Racehorses in a Landscape. There lies the irony, because racehorses don't belong in the wilderness, they are taken to be trained on courses. It is beautiful to me because these horses have taken a break from their lives of training and competing and are taking a stroll through the landscape. Maybe Degas is not meaning to paint an ironic situation at all, but maybe he is pointing out that we are never truly set to do one thing. We have freedom to move around sometimes.
The last one caught my eye because my first instinct told me that it was a painting in Spain. Then I checked the artist and he didn't have a Spanish name, but the title said Plaza de Merced, Ronda. I was so happy to see that is was in Spain. Ronda is a little town in the south of Spain. This is a beautiful colorful depiction of a typical street in some of the smaller cities I have visited in Spain. The artist is actually American and most of his work is done in America. He took a trip to Spain and has a little collection of paintings from Granada, Cordoba, Ronda, and a couple others down in Andalucia.

LAS FALLAS de Valencia

I feel like I can be considered a veteran of the whole extreme fourth of July Evanston experience. I mean what has it been now like six or seven years? Every year we risk our lives as we enter into that war zone. We may get a hit to the car, or even to the leg. We have been known to start fires in the fields, but do I have something to top it or what? It is called Las Fallas, and it takes place in Valencia Spain every year during Semana Santa, or Holy Week. Every year the best falla artists spend six months or more constructing the most detailed elaborate floats to compete for first prize. The two in the pictures were second and first, respectively. All through the day herd, litterally millions, of people walk around the city looking at all the floats, while hooligans run around letting off firecrackers about every two minutes. It is a whole family affair. They do big firework shows about every two hours, in the day and night! It is a crazy atmosphere. There are about four greasy churro stands on every street, cotton candy, musicians, it is just great! At one point there was a huge marching band going down the street, so I jumped in and danced along side, it was just great fun At midnight the tradition is to light the floats on fire! We knew that it would be packed to see the fire so we lined up and made camp in front of the second place float. This was at 9:30. We sat and stood and talked and stood some more til at 11:00 they hurded us behind some barriers so the could prepare the falla. The whole Boberos were there. We sat huddled like sardines as we watched them wind fire works in and out of the float and then surround the float with them. We thought that they would light it at 12, but we found out later that because it was the second best they lit it second to last. At 1:15 after we could barely stand anymore, after about 20 times of chanting Fuega Fuega, and just when we couldn't play any more games, they prepared for lighting. The bomberos were ready with their huge hoses and all was in place. They lit the fuse and like a domino effect everything began to blow up! It was crazy loud. We were right in front, as a result of waiting for so long, so we had a great show! I put this video on even though it is really short it gives you the idea of the noise and chaos! It was truly a once in a life time cultural experience! Being awake for almost 24 hours was worth it for the fun we had!

Lisboa y Sintra

Oi Oi is how they would say it in Portugal! Well the little Spanish travelers took a little vacation to Lisbon Portugal last week! As you can tell from the pictures we had beautiful weather, in such a beautiful country. I was surprised at how many people in Portugal speak English, they almost all understood our English better than our Spanish. That is kind of a bummer for students who are learning Spanish, but oh well. I had one of those cool moments people talk about when they are learning a language. I was sitting on a wall overlooking the city at St. Jorge's Castillo when I heard people speaking and it was something I could understand. And this is the killer, it was Spanish! YEA!! At first I couldn't figure out if it was English or Spanish, because it sounded so normal to me. Oh my I just get emotional thinking about it! Anyway more about Portugal. We stayed in a total college kids hostel, it rocked! We slept nine to a room in bunk beds! Lisboa is a lot like San Fran. At least what I remember of it. It is really hilly, has a replica of the Golden Gate, and has a trolley system! Oh and of coarse I must mention the indigenous Pasteies of Belem, OH MY, and that is what I attribute my extra winter coat to! My favorite part of Lisbon was the World Fair Site. In 1992, I believe, the world Fair was held in Lisbon so they have this whole modernized part of town. We did not get to spend as much time as I would have liked there, but it was beautiful, right on the river. The picture of the flags was taken there, my two countries right next to each other, that is no coincidence. They had a lot of cool new architecture, and bikes for rent, it was a pretty happening place.
On one of the days we took the train about an hour north to visit the pueblo of Sintra. This place would take anyone's breath away. I have never been anywhere like it. The minute we walked off the train it smelled like flowers. Basically the whole town is a garden, and in the midst of the garden is a charming little city. Up on the top of the mountain, which we climbed, there are two castles. One is a moorish castle, the other the extravagant Palacio de Pena! WOW. This place was a popular summer retreat for the kings and queens of Portugal. We walked all through it, it was decorated with designed tiles of green, pink, yellow, blue. It was some what like the Alhambra, with it's Mudejar influence, only more decorated, and furnished. I love when historical places are furnished because it makes it easier to picture the people living there. For example, Mount Vernon, it was awesome because it was furnished how it would have been when George and Martha lived there! Also I love George Washington so I could have liked it because of that too! Sintra was a hit, on the way up the mountain we actually swung from a vine. I know remember we were in Portugal not the Amazon. It was a fabulous trip, everyone came home a little browner, and of coarse just a little more well-traveled!

I am a stylist in case you didn't know!

So my roommate Cassi came to Madrid with long hair, but one day she decided to cut it. We were walking home one day from school and she said, "I think I want to cut my own hair!" In my mind I was thinking, She has got to be crazy! but I just nodded and said ok well good luck with that! haha Little did I know I would be dragged into the ordeal! Actually I wasn't dragged into it, and I guess I sort of offered with a huge apology if anything went wrong! We ended up cutting it with tiny thread scissors on Pilar's deck. It turned out to be a success, with only a couple uh oh's and I really have no idea how I made her hair look so good. As of now I am not taking any other clients. I think it was just a fluky thing.

Pilgrammage to Mecca (or Santiago de Compostela)

Well the group embarked last Tuesday for another 5 day trip, only this time we made our way to the north. Our final destination was the region of Galicia deriving from Galic, or in other words the land of my ancestors! right? well maybe not so much, because Spanish is Spanish, but the region was settled by some Celts. Hence why I could hear bagpipes playing in one of the plazas! In Gallego the language spoken there they are called prazas, cool fact. Ok so the history behind the pilgrimage thing... Santiago de Compostela is the very place where St. James' bones lie. Or so it is believed in the Catholic church. It has become the third main pilgrimage site in the Catholic world. People travel from all over the world to visit this cathedral. They come by way of walking, riding bikes, some drive. All the pilgrims we talked to had walked! We met some awesome guys probably in their late twenties that had been walking for a month from southern France. They said they averaged about 20-25 miles a day! When they walked into the plaza in front of the cathedral, we yelled bien hecho, felicidades to them. They came over and talked to us. One was from Italy, there was a bit of a language barrier, I think he spoke Italian, Spanish, and English to us! He sat and talked to us about the journey. He started all by himself, and had met the other two guys along the way. They were both from Cadiz, southern coast of Spain. We got a picture with them. Wow it was so cool to meet all of these people who sacrificed all that to experience this religious moment! To me, walking 2 miles of the camino de santiago and arriving at the cathedral was cool, but I can't imagine what it means to these members of the Catholic church who really make a sacrifice. I learned a lot from talking to people this week. There are so many good people out there we were warmly accepted everywhere we went in the North. People would stop us on the streets to tell us something about their town, or we would ask them questions and they would help us with whatever we needed. We were given free pastries, a cute farmer gave us a lemon from his tree to make lemonade, they were just interested in us having the best experience possible. I think Maria, a lady we befriended at her pastry shop put it best when we thanked her and commented on her kindness she said, "Somos todos hermanos y hermanas, y tenemos la resposibilidad ser buen personas y ser simpaticas a todos." We are all brothers and sisters and we have the responsibility to be good people and be nice to all we meet. I was so grateful for my ability to communicate in another language, because it has been the tool to meet so many amazing people here in Spain. People all over the world are happy and are trying to be good people, and that was something I could relate with despite the language barrier! P.S. I ate octopus here is a picture yikes! I can't believe it, where are my senses going on eating?

More pictures

My friend Brock takes really great pictures and he posts them on a website. He takes a ton, so you may not want to look at them all. He has each album labeled by city or place. There are more from our trip to Basque country labeled Bilbao and San Sebastian. Here is the site. http://picasaweb.google.com/brocktrw

THE GUG

The four adventurous students were pretty worn out from their long day in San Sebastian yet it did not stop them from waking early the next morning to tackle their next feat, BILBAO! Famous for the Guggenheim Museum, and, well not much else. That was what everyone told us before we went to Bilbao. They all said, well you won't see much other than Guggenheim, it may not really be worth your time. On the contrary, Bilbao was fantastic. It used to be an industrial city, but they have remade it to be more modern hence the theme the Guggenheim represents. We started our tour at the old part of the city. Again there were people and the colorful apartments lining the streets. We visited a huge meat and fish market. Brock kind of had to push me in there. I don't have a problem eating meat I just don't like to see what it looks like before it is ground up or grilled! There were full pig heads hanging, and little piglets curled up in glass windows. The aroma of fish floated up the stairs as I walked past, oh boy. The fish market was worse, they had octopus, squid, ugly fish with there big eyes staring up at you! I zoomed through there pretty quick! After the market we took a stroll by the river that runs through Bilbao. We found ourselves walking around this big park with green rolling hills. It was really beautiful. After subiring(spanglish for climbing) the mountain we took some photos and headed down to the museum. Good thing I had my chaco's because it was some serious hiking! haha no but it was mountainous! The Guggenheim was my favorite part! They offered free audio tours, so we actually ended up learning about the motives behind a lot of the modern art(this is actually really good because otherwise, it is just a green canvas!) After about 3 and a half hours in the museum we felt pretty artsy so we took some photos where we were the subject of the art. That was a favorite line among modern artists, "you are the subject of the art, it is what you make of it" Pretty surreal huh? ha The Guggenheim itself is very modern, it was designed by Frank Ghery and he got his inspiration from fish. That explains the undulating design!After two days of going going we weere pretty tired so we caught our flight and came back to Madrid!

Vive Vascos!

Fuimos a San Sebastian y Bilbao este fin de semana. Era bonita y increible. Oh wait... sorry. I just finished up my Spanish midterms last week where I drilled the past tense into my head. Sheesh good thing right after I finished my test I got to embark on the adventure to Pais Vasco, or Basque country! Emily, Callie, Brock, and I boarded our 6 hour train to Bilbao on Thursday, not really knowing what to expect out of our weekend excursion. We were definently being helped though, because everything in our transportation worked out for us, we found a metro straight to our hostel. That next morning we woke up at 5:30 to yet again figure out how to find the Termibus to San Sebastian about an hour away. We ended up finding it perfectly and almost 20 euro later (yikes) we were on our way to the beach! We were so lucky to have a beautiful day to enjoy the best city in Spain! Right away the people were so nice to us. They would walk with us to tell us how to get places. We chatted with all the Vascos, it was great. They spoke Castellano(Spanish) and Vasco(Basque). Basque is crazy, it is not like spanish at least in spelling, at all. It has z instead of s, k instead of c, and then throw in a bunch of x's. It was such a pleasent town, everyone had that laid back feel. When we were up in the neighborhoods, I could have sworn we were in England, it was so green, and the homes looked a certain style. We hiked around in the mountains, walked along the beach, and I even decided to take a swim. I was running ahead of the others just being entertained by the waves, and I didn't see a little hole in the sand ahead so I biffed it and fell in to water! Everyone said it was hilarious to watch. It was sweet though, because it was so hot I dried pretty quick. We met and awesome old man that was fishing off the wall above the ocean.(technically the Bay of Biscay). Alberto sat there and talked to us for awhile. It smelled awful while he was talking, I looked down and realized he was using poo for bait! It was all over his hands! We got a picture with him and he gave us a card with his address so we could send it to him so he could show his wife the pretty Americana's wearing skirts with beautiful bare legs! haha I took that as a complement! We loved Alberto! We all decided we should be more like the Vascos, and just be friendly and talk to everyone. We hiked up to a huge statue of Christ with a castle, it overlooked the whole bay. I got to dance with some band that was playing by the beach! I didn't realize I had such an audience, but when I finished they made me take a bow, and I got applause! Oh man, I loved everything about San Sebastian! I will put more pictures when Brock posts his, he was kind of the designated photographer!