Monday, December 28
Home
On the 22nd of December i took 26 hours and 3 flights to get home. And now i have had a wondeful time in spain and after a great holiday break, have to get back into the swing of real school. Thanks to all who read this blog or pieces, it was great to know that other people enjoyed my time abroad as well.
Monday, December 21
Sunday, December 20
Quick Trip to Real Madrid
On a whim i decided to go on my last satarday night to the Real Madrid - Zaragosa game. Baught a ticket, hopped on a 5 ockock bus after checking if a hostel had an empty bus and off i went. In the stadium i befriended a lonely brazilian who spoke better english than spanish, and promptly watched a rout of a game. Renaldo is a simply incredible player, he may be a not perfect person but i have never seen someone so fast, so confident, and so obscenely good with his feet.
Listen to this great commentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4Bf_ZxkznY
As a frosting on my cake of a night my friend Chloe from carleton who i thought had returned to the states after studying in Madrid texted me after seeing a facebook update of mine and invited me out in madrid for her 21st birthday!
This morning i rolled out of bed and caught a train home. Now i need to write a final paper, bake cinamin rolls as a thank you present, and pack alot!
Listen to this great commentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4Bf_ZxkznY
As a frosting on my cake of a night my friend Chloe from carleton who i thought had returned to the states after studying in Madrid texted me after seeing a facebook update of mine and invited me out in madrid for her 21st birthday!
This morning i rolled out of bed and caught a train home. Now i need to write a final paper, bake cinamin rolls as a thank you present, and pack alot!
Friday, December 18
Gibralter
In my final full week here i took advantage of my time to head down for two very full days in Gibralter-the british colony in the south of spain. This was my first time traveling truly by myself for any length of time. Upshot of that is that i never once ate alone (except to escape monkeys) and met some great great people. Short and sweet bullet points here we go:
- overnight buses are doable
- someone bought me a round-of hot chocolate
- Walked over 5 miles and made it to sunrise over the Mediterranean
- *africa over my right shoulder
- Found my own WWII siege tunnel-explored
- *if you saw this while lost in gibralter-would you go in?
- Met great Australians, now have 2 new places to visit in my last continent
- So much history its awesome, and its English
- Amazing siege tunnels carved by hand-god bless all the historical fiction i've read it was a nerds paradise
- Carved by hand for over 300 feet to do what the brits do best-screw with the french
- monkeys-brave little buggers ripped the lunch bag from my pocket but are so cute what was i supposed to do? that wasn't rhetorical, what i did was climb to the top of the precipice and eat my lunch in windy Mediterranean solitude
- *no he is not high-just very cheeky
- cold and rainy can't stop me from seeing my history-especially when it is inside of 30 miles of WWII tunnels used to house 11,000 active troops
- Rick Steves makes connection-when people see you instantly have him in common
- Pizza hut is the best comfort food, especially in all you can eat quantities
- Fantastic trip-thanks dad!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=168956&id=563922118&l=2c0f682d66
And a Movie of my lunch spot
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUoYFP25MVM
And for those who missed my other movie of flaming shots in Barcelona-it might be unrelated but its friggin sweet
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPKNt7U_StY
Tuesday, December 8
Eyeing up the End
- Final weeks
- Final papers
- Final travel?
- Final work for spanish class including lots of subjunctive worksheets
- Final paper for english in the real world in which i record and analyze all the English in my world for a day (outside my being an american buble)
- Final paper for spanish history of 4 pages in spanish summarizing 400 plus years of spanish history
- Final paper for jews, muslims, and christians class: 6 pages in spanish summarizing the life of the two minorities in avila-for all time.
Barcelona
A weekend Jaunt in Barcelona!
- Meet up with Melissa
- Meet up with high-school friend Danielle Witt
- Night on the town-its warm!
- Gauidi Architecture is sweet
- Especially Sagrada Familia
- Watch Barcelona-Real Madrid game in a giant bar and Barcelona wins!
- Catalans being Catalans (think southerners cerca 1858 minus the whole slavery thing)
- 12 hour travel time to get home...
So a succesful weekend in Barcelona a week ago as you can see from the bullet points. Getting to see melissa was of course wonderful and always a highlight. Although i hate to admit it seeing danielle was kinda nice to. Wandering Barcelona with melissa as a guide we had a great view of the great 'melting icecream' archetecture of antonin gaidi, which i really liked after being inundated by romenesque and baroque for 3 months!
The real highlight was watching the Real Madrid-Barcelona soccer game from a massive bar in Barcelona-and having barca win. They just plain went nuts. Its like a yankies-red sox times 100 plus national pride at stake. After the game everyone stormed las ramblas (think park blocks) and started singing catalan songs and everything. The Catalonians really do think of themselves as different, mostly because they speak a bastard language of Spanish and french which is legible just frustrating.
Then i got back on the bus and overnighted it down to madrid and took the train-quite exciting.
All in all a great weekend!
full pics: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=165227&id=563922118&l=d9bc07b7d0
Wednesday, December 2
Thanksgiving
Lets just say it was awesome. (the bottle was a rolling pin-i had Fanta)
- 8.5 kilo turkey = 18 lbs of turkey or over 2 lbs per person
- 9 guests including two 'couch surfers' and a german
- 10 dishes
- i made apple pie and mashed potatoes
- a jolly group of all day cooking
- unfortuneatly had to leave early to go to bareclona
Giant turkey
Guests
Great Food
A jolly enviorment
Family
To get the turkey i went to 3 different stores and eventually special ordered it for over 60 bucks from my new friends the local butcher. This baby i believe was killed that morning and was consequiently the freshest turkey i have ever eaten. It barely fit in the oven.
We had 2 couch surfers over to dinner. This is a system of traveling for cheap, you sign up online and offer your couch for people to sleep on while they are traveling and thus you can stay on other people's couches. We got lucky (when i say we i mean the 3 other americans who are teaching english and living in an apartment) and got two awesome Wisconsinites!
Food = awesome
Family = absent but still had the environment.
All in all one of the best thanksgivings I've had.
For full pics http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=164601&id=563922118&l=389f8f9c88
Sunday, November 22
Hanging out with 13th Century Documents-
(most interesting man in the world)Look ma--no Gloves!
First off--to get a sense of who Serafin de Tapia (my history teacher) is--look at his resounding endorsement of Dos Equis beer: (go to minute 1.30)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVwG1t-NVAA&feature=player_embedded#
Second: I have just spend two days in two archives in Avila, manhandling and playing with the original documents from much of Spanish history including:
- the ledger book from a 14th century lawyer detailing various business deals including those of Jews selling and buying property from the church
- Several church documents explaining ordinances related to Jews and their treatment (remarkably these were generally favorable)
- and the real kicker:
- 1492 The only remaining expulsion order of all Jews in Spain signed by the 'Reyes Catolicos' Ferdinand and Isabella
In the picture note the complete lack of gloves. Also be aware that we were probably the only people in the history of the document to get to see it in a private room, without cameras, where we easily could have stolen it. All because Serafin de Tapia is the most interesting man in the world.
Tuesday, November 17
Galicia and La Mancha
I have failed to report on two more weekend excursions in the past month: Galicia and La Mancha
Galicia
- Santiago de Compostela--home of the tomb of St. James and end of a major pilgrimage
- Very Oregon weather--rain!
- Lots of time to kill
- killed by attending mass and befriending old bartender/cafetender
- Magical place with arcaded streets
- 21st birthday with Melissa (thats my present--the uniform)
- Good Spanish friend invited me home for the weekend with her boyfriend and family
- Campo de Criptana--the place where Don Quixote fought his 'giants'
- Wonderful village life--everyone knows everyone and spend weekend outside pubs chatting
- Dinner with band friends included pigs ears and two different versions of 'Spar Spangled Banner'
- Great local food cooked by mom, generally nice having a mom again
- Trip through countryside includes visit to uncles sheep farm
So there you have in bullet points. And here are the more complete pictures on fb:
Galicia:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=160148&id=563922118&l=5cc249d9ab
Friday, November 13
Haircut
So i have finally gotten a haircut--the second in my life that I can remember conducted by someone not my own father. And I'm a fan. Dad take note: the nice lady washed my hair, gave me a head massage, spoke an incomprehensible dialect of Spanish, and then gave me a great haircut. The one catch is that she assumed--understandably--that i usually look like this 
whereas I usually look like this
After we cleared that up all's well!
whereas I usually look like this
After we cleared that up all's well!
Tuesday, November 10
Morocco
I have been remiss and tardy but here we go with my 3-day jaunt to Morocco with a program called Morocco Exchange:
- Gibraltar!
- non-touristy
- (except for the camels)
- 2 nights of homestay
- very odd homestay
- dont talk about the king--you'll go to jail
- Women--where did they go?
- Turkish bath (damn do I feel soft after exfoliating)
- bargaining
- odds and ends
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=159045&id=563922118&l=a5e9a7717d
and
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=159047&id=563922118&l=e74723f244
First off, a highlight of the trip for me came before we even crossed to Africa: Gibraltar. As a history buff and a bit of an anglophile it's honestly one of the coolest places, and I didn't even get to go to the museums or anything. It's an easy bus ride out of town (Algeciras) and then you actually pass through an international border, passports and everything, into a place with far too many souls to fit into its tiny spit of rocky land. The rock rears out like a giant geographical anomaly, just plain too big for everything else around, with a proud but tiny Union Jack crowning its peak. Around its base is a super-compact town which has many purposes: tax haven, tourist trap, business center, airport, and god knows what else. Signs everywhere begging you to come eat fish and chips, and people actaully speaking a language I can understand on the fly (sort of). After wandering the town I was too late to go up onto the rock itself, so I contented myself with a fantastic roast beef and potato dinner!
Right, Morocco.
The group consisted of 15 juniors in college generally from the States (with a smattering of a Guatemalteco, Slovenian, Mexican, and 2 Wisconsinites). The goal was not to see the big sights, but rather to understand the country. To that end we grabbed a ferry from the south of Spain to Tarifa and promptely went to a women's shelter/job training place. An odd but very enlightening way to understand a country. Other than the couscous, the most memorable parts were how open and non-burca'd the women were and my rather massive faux-pas, I almost sent one to jail. I was innocently asking about their political system when they told me they had a pretty much all-powerful king. I then continued on my innocent streak and asked them what they thought of him, to which only the sound of African crickets chirping awkwardly away into silence replied. Eventually the truth came out: if you say anything bad about the king (including just verbally in private) you can go to jail.
So I said this wasn't touristy, well you gotta have a little, right? On one of our marathon drives (in a bus not designed for tall Americans) we pulled over on a beautiful sunset beach to find...camels. The kind where the program pays for you to be as touristy as it gets and mount up for a short ride. Remarkably fun and comfy compared to a horse, except for the getting up and down thing: I think camels have an extra knee.
Homestay: this should conjure up images of mothers who may not speak your language but still inexplicably care for you, feed you indefinitely and cry when it comes time to part. And for most of my group it did, but not me and 2 other boys. We stayed with Yassim--the best I can describe him is as the Arab equivilant of a 'Bro' (popped collar and love of beerpong etc). More on that later, but keep it in the back of your mind.
I'm a big fan of Moroccan food, because I'm a big fan of bread and meat. I also don't like utensils, which practically makes me Moroccan already. Our first meal with homestays was a sort of ground beef/meatballs dish which we ate with the go-to moroccan utensil: the breadclaw. Take a flat round piece of bread about the size of a red fire alarm bell in a school, rip off a piece about the size of a matchbox, and split that in half. Then pinch the food from the main-dish and shovel it into your mouth before gravity remembers that you should be using a fork. And all dishes are communal.
Above is the cous-cous which is not breadclawed becuase even the Moroccans realize how impractical that is.Back to Yassim. We were warned that alcohol is really really really really taboo. If you ask to go out you will be kicked off the program. To which Yassim replies on night one "Want to go to a pub after dinner?" (which he means dance clubs) and on night two "want to just drink in my room?" (after on night one the bouncers didn't let a group of 5 bedraggled and dirty Americans into their classy clubs, the buggers). So taboo, like in the game, is just looking for a way to be skirted.
Women: where did they go? They just don't go out on the street. This was one of the odder things for me, men are just lazing around on the streets all day while I have no idea where the women went. Those you do see in the cities at least usually wear a headscarf.
Rubber Ducky you're the one, you (my rough loofah) make bathtime (sauna plus tap) so much fun! Imam is the turkish bath where you get really really clean without getting submerged. Stage 1: take off clothes save for boxers and give to man to put in cubby
Stage 2: don't forget to bring your loofah and special soap as well as water-scooping rubber maid
Stage 3: using bucket given you by nice man get a whole lot of cold water
Stage 4: go into rather hot sauna room and sit down
Stage 5: quickly stand up and splash place where you want to sit with cold water
Stage 6: check you didn't actually burn your butt
Stage 7: pour water over self and begin scrubbing
Stage 8: keep scrubbing, and I mean scrub. Using a black loofah with the consistency of a greeny sponge.
Stage 9: depending on flexibility/comfort ask friend to scrub back
Stage 10: rinse off
Stage 11: cool down room
Its pretty sweet, and I'm still super soft all over a week later. Maybe guys should exfoliate more or something.
I promise this is almost over, just a jaunt to the countryside left.
After driving through countryside that reminded me a fair bit of a drier coast range, we arrived at a tiny village where our program has befriended a super-nice family. They made us cous-cous (see above picture) and then chatted with us what it's like for them. Noteable highlights of talk included that they would vastly prefer to live in the city because it's so damn hard to live in the country, grandma really wants a new olive press, donkey #2 has gone missing, want children to grow up to be doctors, little child showed up with soccer ball and proceeded to get rocked by my British friend and me.
Nice family
After a brief night in a tourist mecca where I bargained for some Christmas presents in Spanish (a goal of mine since Guatemala when I had to have dad bargain for me) we went home. Check out the pictures up on facebook for a more complete story.
Tuesday, November 3
6/7 Rob Takes the Lead
I'm just back from a weekend of indepth cultural stuff in Morocco but for now i just want to say this: six continents down and one to go. Australia you are next buddy boy.
Sunday, October 25
Soccer with the Colombians
So I was staring forlornly out of my window in the Residence when I saw to kids kicking a soccer ball around. Having recently attempted to take the 'might as well try it' approach to study abroad (and drugs?[no not drugs]) I threw on my cleats and pants, grabbed my gloves and headed out. I was already wearing a shirt for those keeping score. I wandered to the field, and asked them if they needed a goalie. They did, took shots at me, I proved worthy, and half an hour later was taking part in a full-sided game...with all of the Colombians in Avila. It was one of the odder demographics to be interacting with, 2 or three generations worth of mediocre soccer and only one generation worth of defense (the stalwart grandfathers). Needless to say it was a lot of fun, and they have invited the great gringo goalkeeper to their weekly scrimmages!
Saturday, October 24
Andalucia--but not really
Last weekend I went for five days to Andalucia (southern Spain) to explore the history and cultures of the three famous towns there: Cordoba, Sevilla, and Granada. However, while this was a great trip, there really wasn't that much eye-opening or new that you wouldn't see in anyone else's pictures. Yes we saw the great mosque, the ghettos, the courtyards, and a flamenco show, but I want to share more of what has been happening in Avila. And so for those who want to know more about Andalucia take a look at my pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=153375&id=563922118&l=f4f2c1a040
and
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=153377&id=563922118&l=525b786f33
I culled them down from over 500, so don't moan about how many there are!
Post questions or comments on this blog or on the pictures and I'll get back to you with more info on anything that piques your interest!
Wednesday, October 14
Best Weekend So Far--Melissa's Visit and Madrid
Best Weekend:
- Saw girlfriend for first time in 4 months
- had a beautiful 2 year anniversary with her featuring sunset over medieval walled city and fancy dinner
- Went to Madrid to see what we could see
- Prado: art museum featuring el Greco, Goya, and Velasquez
- Guernica
- Bullfight!
For Lots of pictures of Madrid and the bullfight : http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=151270&id=563922118&l=ded72e62de
I will keep this brief becuase I am off to Andalucía (Sevilla, Cordoba, and Granada) for the weekend starting tomorrow.
This was a fantastic weekend. I met my girlfriend of two years Melissa at the train station in Avila, and spent the evening showing her the town. We wandered the ancient medieval streets and followed the path of the walls until we came to a fantastic vista that my professor had showed me. We stayed there for half an hour as the sun set over the cathedral and walls of Avila, and then wandered our way back into the city for a wonderful dinner of roast suckling pig and steak. I also for the first time ever had beer with my meal, its nice being legal but I still don't get what all the hype is about.
After spending the night in the extra room of my very generous American friends' apartment, we headed into Madrid through the Spanish countryside. There we met up with Melissa's traveling companions, a cheerful duo from the US. Together we exhaustively explored the Prado museum, which included many amazing works of art, but featured the most moving picture I have ever seen: Goya's
"The Shootings of May 3rd in Madrid, 1814"
There was also another one of my new favorite paintings, Colussus (possibly by Goya)
We then found ourselves a lovely spot for lunch and exhausted the rest of the day exploring Madrid.
We also ran into the 'Dia de Hispanidad' parade. This is Columbus Day as seen by the conquerors, not by the conquered. Each Spanish-speaking country has a float or dance group in a massive mile-long parade featuring music and dancing and flags and dancing. It was a pretty cool thing to just run into. Thanks for finding us Columbus, it was really important. Here is the Colombian Float featuring a band on top of a semi truck:
That evening Melissa and I met up with several other Carleton students studying in Madrid. It was really nice to get to see them again, and very odd to be talking about Carleton things in a pub in Madrid Spain! However, a damper was put on the night when one of my good friends Caitlin was pickpocketed in the bar, including the keys to her home-stay!
Madrid is a bustling city, especially its partying districts. As Melissa and I wandered our way back to our hotel/hostel we ran across clubs and bars that were just getting started at 3 in the morning, and many kids pregaming at Botellones in the street. We, however, elected for some churros con chocolate, a must!
The next day was more art, including Guernica, but the highlight was the bullfight. After meeting up with more Carls for coffee we learned of a bullfight that afternoon, and promptly made our way over to the very-Arab-styled bull ring. I could go into great depth about the fight and such, but I merely want to say this. The matadors are not the bad asses--it’s the guys who have neither sword, nor cape, nor horse, nor shield, but only insane bull dodging agility. I mean this guy:
After the fight we explored the Parque de Retiro, basically Madrid's central park, and then I had sprint back to the station to catch a train. All in all a fantastic weekend.
Sunday, October 4
"Botellon" --defined as a massive out door drinking party
The botellon is essentially what I imagine a slightly tamer version of fraternity row in, say, the University of Arizona is like, lots of distinct groups of people in clusters drinking and chatting. I would try to do a compare contrast of the club as well, but what with my youthful inexperience/being under 21 I have never been in one in the States!
Saturday was far more mundane, which is certainly for the best. Jen and I have met a British girl named Millie from Manchester at the monastery and spent the day with her at the shopping mall, where I did my best gay best friend impression as long as I could but eventually had to escape from the clothes shopping. The shopping mall was creepily similar to one in the states, if it wasn't for language and tighter jeans I would not have known the difference!
That night we returned to the shopping center with the help of one of my friends from English class and watched 'El Secreto de tus Ojos' which is a remarkably disturbing Argentinean film about a police investigation of a murder/rape/law and order SVU at its worst. And yet it was a good movie, if I didn't catch all of the words the Argentinean accent was at least comforting!
And so here is Sunday, with half an hour till lunch and no desire to study the ever-present and ever-mundane difference between ser and estar. I would complain, but as my Spanish friends point out, there is a whole lot more hard stuff in English than in Spanish.
And as a closing thought, this was the last thing I expected to find in a small town in catholic Spain: a condom vending machine.
Tuesday, September 29
Toledo
Toledo--lots of old Jewish stuff
Escalators of Doom
Trinkets Galore
Did someone say "Arabic influence"--yes I think they did
Saturday was the second trip with the program (me, Jennifer, Serafin the prof, and Gabi) and we went to Toledo. This was a beautiful 2-hour drive south over one of the main mountain ranges of Spain and it really reminded me of crossing the Cascades and gave great vantage points of the countryside. Also, since this is Spain, there were castles haphazardly strewn about the countryside like k-nex toys on my carpet, a big one here, a broken one there, a small group plotting together on that ridge, all over the place:
One of the first things I noticed about the ancient Visigothic and Arabic capital of the Iberian Peninsula were its stupendous escalators. That's right, outdoor make sure you don't get your shoelaces stuck escalators that schlep fat American tourists from the valley floor about 200-400 vertical feet up to the city's mesa.
You also notice how bloody old everything is, a perception which is augmented by the presence of an eminent historian giving you a personal tour (he also looks like the world's most interesting man) (see group picture)
I won't bore you with the history, but Jews were a big deal here and built one of the best Synagogue of all time called La Sinagoga del Transito. In typical fashion the Christians eventually kicked them out and were so impressed with the wall decorations of their 'new' church, they whitewashed it and called it Our Lady of the White. It has since been restored and houses one of the best collections of everything Jewish, and it just plain beautiful. The highlights here are the windows with Moorish latticework and Hebrew carved around the ceiling:
Of course there was also a vibrant tourist section with lots and lots and lots of swords, armor, letter openers, earrings, just about everything made from metal was on sale there.
We ended our day with a glorious vista of the town and a group photo courtesy of the bus driver:
Sunday, September 27
Teaching English
- people here want to learn English
- many have a fairly strong background
- but pronunciation is terrible
To become a police inspector you need to speak at least Spanish and one other language, usually English. This means that a native speaker of English is a great friend to have! Over the past couple of weeks I have spent several nights with some of the police students just speaking English slowly and clearly and correcting their pronunciation. The most recent guy is about fifty and lives in Madrid, as a thanks he gave me a CD of Spanish classic rock/grateful dead style music, it’s pretty cool!
I thought you might be amused by what needs to be written down/explained using writing in the following pictures.
Note:
- multiple instances of B/V pronunciation problems
- that fat man is actually a diagram of Madrid neighborhoods
- detailed explanation of money-laundering
- ZZ-top
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)