My Ocean's Eleven Moment

You know that scene at the end of the new Ocean's Eleven in which all the guys on Ocean's team are standing in front of the fountain and one by one they walk away? For me, that was an incredibly sad scene. It was a tight wonderful group that accomplished a lot together (I know that what they accomplished was criminal, but it was still totally badass and awesome). And the group breaks apart slowly until it's just Danny and Rusty and it feels like they're holding on maybe a little bit past when they should, because they're so sad to see it end? Well that's happening here! In early April, two members of our group left (they were part of a CIEE duo program and spent the fall in Chile so they weren't able to get visas to stay for as long as the rest of us). Then right after Feria two more girls from the program left, along with the best friend of one of those girls who had been with us for over a month and felt essentially like part of the group as well. And tomorrow another girl is going home to catch her sister's graduation from college, which is definitely a good reason to go home, but my goodness! The group has been reduced by almost 50%, which makes me really, very sad.

I have grown so close with my fellow gap year students. We have seen some of the most beautiful sites in Spain together, danced at some of the biggest discotecas in Europe together, gotten lost together, experienced culture shock together. We have been there for each other through everything from tummy aches (thanks to the absurd quantity of fried food we are fed here) to intense bouts of homesickness. For me, being in such a small group, having such an intense (intensely new, intensely exciting, intensely foreign) experience, has made my relationships with all these people grow deep and strong more quickly than I am used to.

The weird thing is, I'm actually happy to be so sad about this people-leaving-thing. My separation anxiety is just another demonstration of how much I have enjoyed my time here and the people with whom I have shared it. That's a silver lining, yes ma'am! And happily, a lot of the people here with whom I am close live in the Boston area, just like me. So it shouldn't be too hard to stay in touch once we get back on the treadmill of non-gap year life.

La Feria de Abril

If Andalusia satisfies a lot of stereotypes about Spain and its people (bullfighting, Flamenco dancing, wine drinking, nap taking), Feria de Abril does most of the work. Feria is a week-long party that takes place on a huge stretch of land in Los Remedios (my neighborhood!) that is empty for most of the year--in fact, the only thing that takes place there is Feria.

During Feria,most women dress up in traditional Flamenco garb,

called trajes de gitana, or gypsy dresses!

The partying--which includes a lot of drinking, a lot of live music, and above all, a lot of dancing Sevillanas--occurs in casetas (tents) owned and operated by businesses, families, or public organizations such as sports teams and political parties. The most charming casetas (and the one with the lowest food/drink prices) are private. This means you have to either get a paper invitation or belong to a family that is well-known in that caseta. Luckily for us, we were able to get into a number of private casetas: my host father Paco gave me two admit-two tickets to his, and a friend of mine's host family certified that we would be able to enter theirs. Most of the casetas we entered were divided into two rooms: one with tables, chairs, and a stage, where people could eat and watch/dance Sevillanas, and another with a bar and empty space for people that wanted a more casual dancing environment. A few casetas also had spaces set up for live bands.

At the mouth of the Feria grounds is la portada, a giant gate designed and constructed anew every year. I believe that I mentioned in a previous post that it is right at the end of one of the main streets in Los Remedios, down which I walk every day on my way home from school. It was cool watching its development, and the final product was quite impressive. This year the gate was celebrating 100 years of flight, which is why there is a model plane hanging in the top of the figure 8.

The gate is also the city's motto: see the NO8DO?

Feria is, in one word, overwhelming. The lively music in every caseta and the excited shouts of thousands of Sevillanos cause quite a din, while the colorful lanterns and brightly patterned dresses make for a kaleidoscopic landscape. The only sense that suffers is the olfactory: the smell of horse droppings mixed with alcohol and fried food was unpleasant. Feria is also exhausting: you spend a lot of time on your feet, and you essentially become nocturnal, spending 11 pm to 6 am at the Feria grounds and sleeping until 2 in the afternoon. At least, that's what my friends and I did most of the week. People are really at Feria all day because there is always something exciting going on. The Feria grounds contain a huge amusement park and during the afternoons traditionally-dressed horsemen gallop or pull carriages through the streets (hence, the smell). Some gal pals and I spent only one afternoon at the Feria grounds. We rode a very tall ferris wheel, which was a little scary but also fun! We had a great view of the hundreds of casetas and the horse-drawn carriages trotting through the streets.

Those are jingle bells on the horses' faces. Poor things, the sound probably drove them nuts,

but as fast as they ran from it, they couldn't escape it!

As fun as Feria was, it didn't sadden me too deeply to return to a normal, more restful schedule at the end of the week. True, getting used to waking up at 8:30 for class was killer, but I'm really awful at staying up until 6 am!

The Rides of March, Part Two

Apologies for the cliffhanger. Further apologies for that sarcasm just now. So, I had just finished describing the first half of the Rides of March, that is, Dad's visit, Morocco, and Barcelona. Next up was Cádiz.

In June 2007, I went to Madrid with an exchange program through my high school. There I lived with a wonderful family, Los Moreno, with whom I grew very close. They are goofy and warm, just like my own family, and they immediately welcomed me as their own daughter/sister. Since then, I have stayed in touch with Teresa, the daughter who is my age. When I told her I was coming to Sevilla, we decided we had to figure out a time to meet up.

Los Moreno invited me to their new house in Cádiz during Semana Santa, the Holy Week that a lot of people have off from school and work. I had never been to this house before--when they brought me to Cádiz in 2007, we stayed in their old house in Sancti Petri. We did visit Zahara and the site of their new house--at that point, it was just a white outline on the beach. I was so excited to see the finished and furnished product this time around.

Los Moreno picked me up in Sevilla and made me feel at home instantly by complimenting the improvement in my Spanish and teasing me about my Andaluz accent. Maite (la madre) is originally from Cádiz, so she was thrilled to hear me drop my s's, but Álvaro (el hermano mayor) gave me a hard time for speaking "Andaluz en vez de Castellano" (instead of Spanish). In my family, as in their family, teasing means love, so I welcomed this display. A two-hour drive south later, and we arrived in Zahara. The house is so cool: it is modern, with walls that slide back and reveal stunning panoramic vistas and with circular windows that remind me of portholes--perfect for the beach.

Almost immediately, Teresa and I donned our bathing suits, grabbed our towels, and bolted down to the beach. And WHAT a beach. The sand was soft and white and the water was clear and clean (and cold). There was a lot of trash farther up among the grassy patches, but we ignored this. There were also a few dead dolphins who had washed up because of some crazy storms (apparently Zahara suffered a lot of floods this winter, as did many areas in Spain). These were very sad, so we tried to avoid them as well.

Catching up with Teresa was a lot of fun. We talked a lot about our friends from the exchange, travels over the past few years, and her studies (she is in her first year of a six-year college track-she is becoming a doctor). In Spain, you basically choose what you want to major in before your junior year in high school, and then apply to your appropriate department at various universities. The amount of time you spend in college depends on what career you have chosen. Teresa filled me in on the application process. I knew from before that a huge part of pursuing higher education in Spain was la Selectividad, but I didn't realize just how important this 3-day test was. Apparently, it accounts for 40% of a score (the other 60% being high school grades) that is sent to colleges, along with nothing else. That's it. That's all--the score. No interview, no personal essay, no recommendations, nothing else. This method, while certainly efficient, strikes me as terrifying (talk about test-day stress) and cold. One of the things that I am most looking forward to about college is the texture of a diverse student body: people with a ton of different experiences, passions, personalities, quirks, flaws, hopes, dreams. How can you assemble a group like that just by looking at one score? It seems to me that you'd end up with a lot of similar people: kids who studied really hard and test well. I think that people are worth much more than their ability to memorize and turn out a well-organized essay, and I don't think that the Spanish school system agrees. Oh well. It just makes me appreciate the U.S. system more I guess.

Along with our chats, Teresa and I practiced some of our favorite activities from 3 years ago, those being playing cards (she is an absolute champion) and watching the O.C. (we love quoting it ad nauseam). My 3 days in Cádiz flew by too quickly, and before I knew it, she and Maite were driving me to the train station, singing along to MIKA (they love him) and some recordings of chirigotas (they had to explain the songs to me at intervals because the clever men of Cádiz sang way too quickly for me to catch anything).

After returning from Cádiz, I was on a mission to experience Semana Santa as fully as possible in two short days before leaving for Amsterdam. Semana Santa is a week-long celebration of the life of Jesus Christ, culminating in El Domingo de Resurreccion (The Sunday of the Resurrection, which nobody calls Easter and which does not involve bunnies or eggs). To celebrate, the churches of Sevilla put together processions. These processions can last anywhere from two to thirteen hours. Every procession departs its church, wherever it may be, and makes its way into the city center and down the carerra oficial, the official path. This path runs along some of the biggest and most important streets in Sevilla, eventually going behind City Hall and up Avenida de la Constitución (the biggest street) toward la Catedral.

Every procession includes Nazarenos, members of the church who dress in long tunics and wear tall pointed hoods which cover their faces except for two eye holes. The colors of the outfit depend on the church. To many Americans, the uniform of the Nazarenos is reminiscent of a terrifying and hateful group in our country, but actually, the Nazarenos dressed like this long before the KKK even existed.

Nazarenos bearing La Cruz de Guía, the cross that opens every procession.

The people carrying and surrounding the cross are usually important members of the church.

Other important players in the processions are the costaleros, strong burly men (they are always men, unlike Nazarenos, who are often women and children as well) who carry the pasos, or large altars, through the streets. These pasos are very heavy: every costalero ends up carrying about 50 kg (110 lbs). Every brotherhood, that is, every church, presents two pasos: one depicting a scene from the life of Jesus, and another of the Virgin. On Palm Sunday, all the pasos depicting Jesus show his entry into Jerusalem. On Thursday night--during which the processions last until the early hours of the morning and people are accustomed to staying out all night--the images are all of his death. To mourn, women dress in black dresses and don La Mantilla, a lace scarf that hangs from a stiff comb worn in the hair. The following Sunday, the day of the Resurrection...well, you can guess what the image on that day is. Other than that, the scenes from Jesus's life appear un-chronologically.

A paso from the life of Jesus--I was too far away to figure out what this scene is though.

This Paso was going down the Carerra Oficial: it is behind City Hall at this point.

Happily, it did not rain in Sevilla during my two-day stint. When it rains, the pasos do not go out: they are too fragile. Since the Nazarenos and Costaleros practice for the procession for the entire year (many times this winter I saw men carrying scaffolding with bags of bricks placed atop to practice bearing the weight of the paso) it is very, very sad when the processions are cancelled.

A customary treat served in Sevilla during Semana Santa is torrija: bread soaked in milk and egg that has been fried and then doused in honey and sugar. So, french toast, but worse for you. It is served in cafés and bakeries for the weeks surrounding Semana Santa, but the best torrija is home-made, and happily, my family fried up a delicious batch while I was in town. I enjoyed it immensely.

After seeing as many pasos as I possibly could during two short days (I think I saw 7, not including the many that I walked by on my way to watch others), I flew to Amsterdam with a group of friends. Due to the legality of many vices in Amsterdam, a lot of people assume that a visit to the city would involve little more than partying. But partying did not really interest me: I was most excited to visit the Anne Frank museum. This girl's story, warm and tragic at the same time, has always been interesting and captivating to me. As a symbol of hope through adversity, she is my hero. As an example of tragic injustice, she is somebody I will always carry in my heart. And as a writer, she is a role model. Expressive and descriptive, her diary is at once intimate and for the public; it is not just a detailed account of the Holocaust, but also a story about growing up. We waited in line for over an hour and a half as it rained, and the wait was well worth it.

The Anne Frank House was a well-balanced mixture of historical and emotional material. The annex in which they lived is preserved though unfurnished (when the Nazis raided the home, they took all the furniture. Otto Frank, the only surviving member of the Frank family, wanted the annex to be left that way). Personal--and moving--touches remain: pencil marks on the wall in the parents' bedroom, indicating the children's growth, and Anne's movie star collection still pasted on her wall. Especially moving for me was the attic. Visitors are not allowed up; they may only look inside. While I would have loved to have seen the attic, I thought preserving this space, keeping it tourist-free, was a good choice. As we reached the base of the attic ladder, the sun came out and the room--a place I viewed as Anne's refuge, her childish domain, when I read the diary--was filled with warm light.

While the Anne Frank House was unequivocally the highlight of the Amsterdam trip for me, I also enjoyed the Rijks Museum and the Keukenhof Tulip Festival. I desperately wanted to visit the Van Gogh Museum, but I only spent 2 days in Amsterdam, so I didn't have time to get there (Keukenhof, which is about an hour away from Amsterdam by bus, was a whole-day affair). Here are some photos from those other two adventures:

And that concludes my chronicles of the Rides of March. Next up: Feria de Abril!

The Rides of March, Part One

Before I apologize for not posting recently, hear this: March was the busiest month ever. The first weekend of the fine but busy month, my dad and godfather visited. Less than a week after they left, four days were spent in Morocco, and right after that I spent 5 days in Barcelona. Semana Santa (the week-long Easter celebration) followed almost immediately thereafter. It saw me soaking up the spectacle in Sevilla, scooting down to Cádiz for a beach hangout, and then jetting off to Amsterdam to catch the famous tulip festival. Basically, 5 awesome weeks, but 5 weeks in which I neglected this blog. Sorry.

My dad and godfather's visit was excellent. It felt great to be able to show them around the city-to be an expert, an old hat, a Sevillana. I also didn't realize how much I missed them until they showed up outside the Cathedral! We did a lot of touristy things--a tour of la Catedral and Real Alcázar and a visit to the Maestranza (the bullring)--and took a survey of the comida fina(classy food) of Sevilla, something that was as alien to me and my student budget as it was to them. We also went out to dinner with my host parents, Paco and Helena. I was really nervous about going out with all of them and being the translator, but it turned out just fine. Turns out reactions to delicious food do not require translation. The evening was also certainly lubricated by a few bottles of Rioja.

Paco (my host father), Helena (my host mother), Clifford (my godfather), my dad, and me at dinner.

We went to a wonderful restaurant in what Helena called Triana pura--

the most authentically Spanish part of Triana, the proudest barrio Sevillano!

My four days in Morocco, which where spent in Asilah, Rabat, and Chefchaouen, were amazing. Asilah is a beautiful seaside city: the buildings are all white with brilliant blue and turquoise accents, and every year new murals are painted on designated white-washed walls. Rabat was dingier, but with beautiful architectural interruptions: an ornate, magnificent mausoleum built in the 1960s (even though it looks like it is hundreds of years old), the remains of a mosque designed by the same guy who designed La Giralda, the bell tower of our Cathedral here in Sevilla, and Chellah, a site of ancient ruins. In Rabat we stayed with homestay families, which gave us access to wonderful homecooked meals. We also went to a Hammam -- a public bath--and did some great exfoliating. We spent very little time in Chefchaouen, which was touristy: mostly we just explored the markets there. Morocco was unlike anything I have experienced before. I had never been to an Arabic-speaking, Muslim, developing, or African country before. So going to an Arabic-speaking AND Muslim AND developing AND African country presented me with a lot of new things.

The 5 daily calls to prayer were certainly new for me. At first they took me by surprise, but I got used to them very quickly-I actually enjoyed being woken up by the sunrise prayer. It was beautiful and alarming because of how unfamiliar it was.

The poverty we saw in some places was disturbing: we drove by a Slumdog Millionaire-esque shantytown and my friend Sarah and I had tea in a home insulated with garbage. But at the same time we were presented with examples of relative wealth and abundance. For example, our meeting place (and the homestay of 3 of the boys on the trip) was a three-story house with high ceilings, beautiful tiles, and luxe furniture. Seeing such a dramatic juxtaposition was really interesting, especially after living in the Boston area my whole life (a very socio-economically segregated region).

The customs were also a surprise for me. It is rude for members of the opposite sex to publicly display any affection, which, given that our group likes to hug, required some adjustment on our part. Also, it is common to eat with your hands, using stiff bread as a sort-of-utensil (you load the cous cous or whatever delicious, well-seasoned thing you're eating onto the bread and eat it in one yummy bite). BUT the left hand is considered the "dirty hand" -- the one used for going to the bathroom -- so it is rude to use it while eating. That also took some getting used to.

The fantastic cous cous my friend Sarah and I were served in our Moroccan homestay.

Apparently, Friday is cous cous day. What a great day.

After Morocco, we went to Barcelona. Tragically, no pictures will be posted in this section of this massive update because my camera and wallet were stolen at a club. HUGE bummer, but I managed to stay pretty calm about it. My friends were very supportive and Nancy gave me a number to call where I could fill out a police report in English, which was good because, as comfortable as I have gotten with my Spanish, the thought of filing a police report in my second language stressed me out a bit. Other than that minor snare, Barcelona was great. We accomplished a lot of touristy goals: we saw Gaudí's La Sagrada Familia and his amazing park Güel, visited the Centre de Cultura Contemporania de Barcelona (CCCB) (awesome and very interesting), the Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) (awful and super weird) and the Picasso Museum. It is so cool seeing things like La Sagrada Familia and Picasso's work, which I studied in my History of Art and Architecture class last year, in real life! I can't wait to take more in-depth Art History courses in college. We also took a tour of FC Barcelona's stadium. There are no words that could possibly capture how swank this stadium is! There is also an FC Barcelona Museum attached to the stadium, which chronicles the history of both the team and sport. Visiting this Museum and having attended an FC Sevilla vs. Moscow match two weeks earlier turned me into a futbolista -- a huge soccer fan! I have even started learning the Sevilla song by listening to it on YouTube.

OK, I can't continue writing right now, and I am only halfway through describing the Rides of March. Cádiz, Semana Santa, and Amsterdam will be described in another post shortly, because if I don't post this update right now, it will enter the black hole of things that I put off until they are irrelevant.

The all-nighter: Cádiz and back in 12 hours

Never in my life had I pulled an all-nighter before two weekends ago. Of course I had stayed up until the wee hours of the morning at some sleepovers, but always in the comfort of PJs and a sleeping bag. So I was unprepared for the adventure my group went on two Saturdays ago: an 8-hour promenade through the streets of Cádiz at its famous Carnaval, which takes place over the course of eleven days every February. Regarded as one of the best Carnavals in the world, this fiesta was a must-see for our adventurous group. We were excited to witness and participate in the tradition of showing off creative disfraces (costumes). We were also eager to watch the legendary chirigotas--large singing groups that write and perform satirical music commenting on politics and current events.

So on a cold (at least, by Andalusian standards) Saturday night we donned our regrettably store-bought costumes and took a train to Cádiz. We noticed some great costumes on the train: my favorite group comprised five girls wearing big sunny-side up eggs made of foam and traditional Flamenco accessories--a Spanish omelette!

When we arrived in Cádiz, we were greeted by an ever-growing mob of people in crazy outfits. We passed a large plaza packed with food vendors and made our way into a knot of narrow and winding streets, where most of the celebration was taking place. As difficult as navigation was (walking through Cádiz was reminiscent of the first days I spent in Sevilla, confused, with my nose in a map) we managed to find our way to another large plaza housing a stage. There we watched a chirigota perform and talked--or rather, shouted over the crowd and the amplified voices of the witty Spanish singers--with some Andalusian natives.

I was impressed by how warm and welcoming the people we met at Carnaval were. The only comparable event I have ever attended in Boston is the 4th of July fireworks spectacle, where people were definitely not as friendly!

After leaving the chirigota concert, we wandered around the city, in and out of cafés, taking in some much-needed caffeine. At 5 in the morning--8 hours after arriving in Cádiz--we boarded our train back to Sevilla. As much fun as I had in Cádiz, it felt good to go back to the city that now feels like home.

Popurrí

I have been in Sevilla for one month--long enough to have established a daily routine but not long enough to feel like my routine isn't special. So every time something unexpected/funny/foreign happens, I get excited and file it away in my brain, saving it for emails, this blog, and stories for my grandchildren. In the states, when something unexpected/funny/foreign happens, I take less than a second to think about it and throw it away. But here, my brain is quickly growing crowded with those unexpected/funny/foreign happenings. So today's post is a little bit of potpourri, or as it's called here, popurrí.

Jorge's Latest Shenanigans

1. Jorge walked in on me getting into the shower. He ran into his room, very upset. I like to think that I was cool as a cucumber in this situation, saying I didn't care and that now he has hard evidence that I do NOT have a culo gordito.

2. Jorge has chicken pox (maricela). I have also had chicken pox so I know I won't get it, but I certainly can get shingles. Which is why I grow very upset when he comes into my room and rubs his face on my pillows and clothes. Which he has done more than once.

3. Jorge has taken to picking up cushions from the couch and waving them at me, yelling "TORO! TORO!"

4. Yesterday I walked into the apartment, greeted by Jorge shouting, "hola fea, Papa está haciendo caca!" Roughly translated, "whaddup uggo, Dad's pooping!"

Hermanitas de los Pobres

I realized I couldn't handle working with the people who were really mentally out of it. While working with them was an emotional drain, I think what actually made me decide to seek a change was my inability to communicate. They couldn't understand a word I said, and the few times they spoke, I couldn't understand what they said. They also kept asking me to take them home (or to their rooms) or just let them leave. When I could find an actual employee to tell them that the elderly person was tired and wanted to rest, they told me I wasn't allowed to take them back to their rooms.

I decided I was awful company for them and that I was not getting enough practice speaking Spanish. I went to Nancy, the gap year coordinator/mother hen here and told her I was unhappy with my volunteer situation. She ironed things out for me so that the next time, I only worked with people who could carry on conversations about things that exist. I helped in a computer class and sat in on a memory class. My time in the computer class is sort of how I pictured all of my time in the elderly home going: talking to people, helping them, making them laugh. I was seeking grandparent-grandchild relationships with these people, and I could feel that (sort of...a little...hopefully) happening in the computer class.

Then, during their memory exercises, I had a great time even though I wasn't really helping out. María, the occupational therapist whom I follow around and try to assist, read the elderly folks a paragraph about a man celebrating his birthday. Then she gave them a copy of the paragraph with some words, names, numbers and dates left out so they could fill in what they remembered. Chaos ensued as everybody started cheating off each others' papers and mouthing answers to one another from across the table. It was so funny to see these elderly folks--who until this point had seemed so dignified--go a little nuts with the exercise. I am hoping that from now on I can take a more active role; I would feel better being more helpful and getting to interact with some of the ancianos.

Sevillanas Class

I haven't really said that much about Sevillanas yet. This four-part dance, a Flamenco derivative, is practiced at the Feria de Abril, a week-long fiesta that takes place every--yes, you guessed it--April. Feria is a huge deal here: every year a new gate is constructed at the mouth of the fair grounds. The gate is huge and glitzy and very close to where I live, so I have been keeping tabs on its development! The dresses are also a big deal; every self-respecting Sevillana owns at least three. My host mother, Helena, owns five, including one for when she is pregnant. Since Feria is so important, the CIEE girls decided it would be embarrassing if we couldn't participate even a little. We haven't discussed the fact that we might not get to put our moves to use because Feria is really for true Sevillanos; the casetas, or dance tents, are all invitation-only. Putting aside that small snag, we threw ourselves into intense study at a dance school in Triana. It is a lot of fun, as public humiliation often is if you can master the art of self-deprecation. The CIEE girls make up the majority of the class, but there are a couple of 8-year old Sevillanas who kick our asses twice a week from 7-8 pm. We tend to ignore them because they have an advantage (it's in their DNA, I'm serious).

La Matanza

Remember before I left for Spain, when I wrote that I hoped people in Sevilla would like jamón serrano as much as people in Madrid do? Well, they like it more. In fact, here they have jamón ibérico, which is supposedly even better. Serrano is to ibérico as Dunkin' Donuts is to Starbucks. I can't tell the difference, but the latter is considered to be of a higher quality and thus is much more expensive. The point here is that in order for people in Sevilla to be happy, a lot of pigs have to die. And so, my gap year group was brought to a matanza (slaughter) of a pig in the countryside this weekend. I was dreading this. Even hard-core aficionados of toreo (bullfighting), which to me, looks pretty gross, were shocked when I told them my weekend plans. "You're going to see a matanza? Those are really disgusting. You will probably be a vegetarian by Monday."

The matanza was, in fact, really disgusting. It was sad and disturbing when the pig was brought out of the truck and forced onto the slaughtering table, and it made some pretty upsetting noises. Fortunately, after it died and the carniceros (butchers) burned off its hair and skin (that was also pretty gross, for the record), it no longer looked like an animal. It looked like uncooked food. After the pig had been dismembered, we left and went to a nearby museum. It was a jamón museum. I'm telling you, they take it really seriously here.

The guy who administered the fatal cut, sharpening his knives.

I can't imagine a pig-killer looking any different, can you?

Needless to say, I'm glad the matanza is over and that there isn't another one scheduled for this semester. While this experience failed to convert me to vegetarianism, it did make me feel like puking and/or crying.

I've let the matanza overshadow our visit to Córdoba, an error which I will now try to correct because Córdoba is really quite impressive. I had studied its famous mosque-turned-cathedral in Art History last year. I was dazzled by the rows and rows of red and white arches and the delicate light that entered through high-up windows and trickled down to the floor. I had high expectations for the visit to Córdoba, and those expectations were all surpassed by miles. I will let some of my photos do the talking:

The cathedral, which was built inside the mosque. Another burn on Islam!

An example of the aforementioned red and white

arches being bathed in delicate light.

The arches and some typical Islamic architecture.

The columns are all different from one another because they were recycled--taken

from ancient ruins! Sustainability points.

El grupo!

Well, I must say hasta luego. I have dance class tonight! More on that in my next post, I promise.

Hermanitas de los Pobres

Today was my first day at my volunteer job. I chose to work at an elderly residence called Hermanitas de los Pobres (it is run by nuns). So far it's not exactly what it was advertised as--which was going on walks with old people and doing arts and crafts with them--but that's okay. Hopefully there will be some arts and crafts in my future there, because I love arts and crafts so, so much, but if there aren't, I'll live. I mean, the promise of arts and crafts was definitely really appealing to me when I chose where I would volunteer, but it wasn't what sealed the deal. The real reason I liked the idea of Hermanitas so much was I thought it would be a great place to develop meaningful friendships--because a lot of the elderly are eager for these--and practice my Spanish. I was a little depressed by the mental capacity of some of the people I met today. I know that when you get older, you lose your memory and some people get Alzheimer's, but I wasn't prepared for what I saw today. I watched a 91-year-old woman named Carmen try to identify the first four letters of the alphabet and distinguish between the colors red, orange, yellow and green. It's scary thinking about that happening to my parents, people my age, me. My mind, my capacity for thought--even about stupid things like television and which cookies to buy--mean so much to me. I had the most fun I've ever had working on my high school newspaper because it was fast-paced, it required thinking things through from start to finish, and it required the ability to articulate one's thoughts. I don't ever want to lose those abilities. I don't want anybody to ever have to lose those abilities.

Well, I feel I must end my musings on a happier note, so here are two lists.

Funny things that have happened recently:

1. Jorge, the 3-year-old in my host family, has taken to calling me "culo gordito" (fat ass) and "fea" (ugly). "Buenas noches, fea!" Ouch.

2. I saw a little boy (not that little though. Probably like four or five years old) peeing in the street while his mother encouraged him. I was surprised by this because Sevilla is very clean and not in the third world.

Things I have learned from Juande:

Juande, my Communication teacher (the aforementioned Mercedes teaches Grammar) is a very colorful character. Highlights from his classes include

1. The time when he announced definitively that monogamy is unnatural. I tried to prove him wrong with the examples of lobsters and penguins (which I learned mate for life through "Friends" and Never Been Kissed, respectively), and he said, "no somos ni langostas ni penguinos," meaning, "when you grow up, you either won't get married or your husband will cheat on you." Sweet, Juande.

2. The time he tried to explain "playing doctor" to the class and we weren't sure if he was talking about little kids taking each others' temperatures with Fisher Price equipment or slightly older kids doing slightly naughtier things.

3. The time he told us to be careful where we announce how much we like churros because apparently the name of this delicious dessert is a euphemism for penis.

4. The time he kicked me out of class because I said Lady GaGa was the next Madonna.

I love Juande.

Settling in

Since my last post, I have joined up with the CIEE group and started settling into my homestay and classes. Our group is great. The people seem very enthusiastic and so far everybody has been really nice. A major plus is that four of the kids were here last semester, so they have been showing us around and filling us in on the best places to get cellphones and churros.

My host family is the bomb. The parents are relaxed and welcoming, making me feel at home but also giving me space and letting me go out whenever. The kids are really cute and friendly: the little ones like to hug me and hold my hand and the older one likes to play Europoly (like Monopoly with Spanish properties and Euros) with me! I live across the river from el centro, in a family neighborhood (mostly residential with a few shops here and there). The walk to school takes me just under a half an hour, giving me a good amount of time to think, listen to my iPod, and enjoy my surroundings.

The Spanish classes are set up in a very relaxed way. We basically just talk for hours at a time and ask the teacher when we don't know what something means. Today we talked about fashion. Yesterday we talked about menage-a-trois (sp?) and where everybody was from. The great thing about this chill, conversational set-up is that I am learning a lot more colloquial Spanish than I ever did in high school. The teacher, Mercedes, doesn't seem to mind going off on tangents, as long as everybody is talking and doing so en español!

I've also learned a bit more about Sevilla. The oranges I mentioned before are apparently really bitter and no good to eat. Every spring they are picked and sent to England though, where they are turned into orange marmalade! When I heard this I laughed because orange marmalade is something I always have associated with little British school boys who are asking their Daddy for some toast. I've also learned that bicyclists make no effort to avoid pedestrians and travel at incredibly high speeds. Apparently four kids doing my program were hit last year! So that's something I'm going to have to be careful of. Other things I have learned are: people are late (my teacher didn't arrive at our 11:20 afternoon class until 11:35, so I guess I can take my time getting my café con leche during break), January-March is the season for rebajas--sales--and so all the shops are packed, and people live with their parents until their mid-twenties or early thirties.

That's all for now. I'm going to do my homework assignment and then get to bed early, because tomorrow is FUNKY NIGHT at a discoteca in town. I have to get some good rest or else I will be pretty cranky at school on Thursday.

Experiencing Sevilla as a tourist

Today my mom and I did a lot of touristy things around el centro, the center of Seville. First we walked to la Catedral de Sevilla. While taking some photos of the imposing, impressive outside architecture, we were approached by a woman carrying short fragrant branches. She gave us one each and started telling us our fortunes, which we knew she would charge us for, but it was fun so we let her take total advantage of our blatant status as confused extranjeros. She told me I would get married and that my mother would live a long life. My mother started to hand her a 2 euro coin but she insisted that we give her more. “Coins are bad luck. You must give me paper money.” But we needed the paper money, the larger denomination, to get into la Catedral. So we told her that we were giving her all we could. I’m pretty sure she cursed us. So I’m a little freaked out by that. My mom told me not to worry, but clearly she’s never had a gypsy curse placed on her before.

view of La Catedral and La Giralda. The dome covers the room with the Bishop's chair.

Anyway, slightly shaken up (but not shaken down), we entered the astonishingly large Catedral. It was so beautiful, but in a dark, intimidating way. My mom, an architect, was amused by the agglomerative styles. The building was originally constructed as a Mosque (1184-1198), its famous Giralda bell tower a minaret. The building’s Islamic roots are still visible--for example, in the mushroom-shaped Puerta del Perón--though not overwhelming like the Gothic elements (then again, I supposed Gothic elements were supposed to be overwhelming...) After the Mosque was consecrated as a Cathedral in 1248 (burn!) the space was renovated four additional times: in a Gothic style (1434-1517), during the Renaissance (1528-1601), during the Baroque period (1618-1758), and between 1825-1928, when the three main doors and the southwest corner were added. The interior is covered in ornate drips of gold and painstakingly carved wood and stone. The ceilings are vaulted and very high, reaching 37 m at the center of the transept. My mom, who is not only an architect but also an historian, commented that she hates seeing such lavishness within Catholic spaces--it reminds her of how corrupt Catholicism was centuries ago. “People were literally starving while this was being created” (referring to an especially gaudy gold crown). I did really enjoy the room with the Bishop’s chair--it was a brighter space with a pretty cupola.

After leaving la Catedral, we nourished ourselves with some café and walked to Real Alcázar, the royal palace about which I have heard much wonderful praise. This was such a peaceful experience, especially after my gloomy and heavy experience in la Catedral. I want to come back to Real Alcázar every day that I am here. Obviously that will not be possible, but hey, a girl can dream. I think the grey sky and slight drizzle made the bright walls brighter, the old tiles clearer, and the lush vegetation riper. Normally I prefer sunny weather, but today I was grateful for its absence. Islamic influences are far more apparent here: I noted many semi-circular arches and arabesques.

Major highlights were

• El Estanque de Mercurio (Mercury’s Pool), which, if I remember correctly, was originally part of some plumbing that was turned into a decorative pool in the 16th century. Don’t quote me on that, though.
• Los Baños de (the baths of) Doña María de Padillas, a long originally uncovered pool that was enclosed in a vaulted space after an earthquake.
• El Cenador del León (The Lion Bower), a pavilion named for the lion statue in the fountain opposite the bower.
• Cuarto del Almirante (The Admiral’s Room), in which important cosmographic discoveries of the Americas, and the first trip around the world, were organized.

looking up at El Estanque de Mercurio from a sunken terrace

Expect more on Real Alcázar. A lot more, I hope! Everybody should get to see this place. Time for dinner! Even though the real Sevillanos won’t be sitting down to dine for another two hours...

Getting here (Sevilla)

I am afraid of flying.

Correction: flying makes me nervous, but I am downright terrified of airports. They are really confusing and busy, and I am awful at navigating. I can barely find the post office from my house in Boston, and the post office is like 4 blocks away. So getting from Boston to Madrid and from Madrid to Seville was a little daunting for me. Happily, my father gave my mother a trip to Europe (doesn't that sound much more classy than "Eurotrip?") which she decided to use now in Seville. Flying over with her eased my fears a lot/made it so that I didn't have to figure anything out on my own. Plus, now I am here early and handling all the communication with natives. So I am getting a chance to flex my Spanish muscles, which are kind of atrophied, before classes begin. Bonus!I'm glad I didn't have to get here alone, because transit was kind of nuts. Flying from Boston to Madrid was a piece of cake, but there was an unusually heavy snow in Madrid (my friend Teresa, who lives there, told me all schools and universities were closed), so our flight to Seville was delayed from 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. I don't mind delays at all-they offer a chance to snooze, read, and listen to music. But get ready for some wild stuff. A lot of flights were

entirely cancelled. There were 4 lines to the Iberia (a Spanish airline) desk, each with about 200-250 people waiting to figure out what to do about their cancelled flights. Understandably, people were frustrated that they were stuck in Barajas and that they had to wait so long, so obviously they STARTED A MINI-RIOT. Logical. The people in the line started chanting really loudly and standing up on tables and whistling and getting in the faces of the Iberia people, so THE AIRPORT CALLED IN SOME SOLDIERS WHO WERE CARRYING AROUND RIFLES. The rioters also woke me up from my nap. Anyway, we eventually got on our plane after hanging out with this cool Canadian lady for a while and we arrived here, in Seville. We did kind of take a rogue taxi, who, because he wasn't official (which we didn't know when we got in) couldn't drive on a lot of the inner streets of the city. So he dropped us 10 blocks away from the hotel with awful directions and we got a little lost and it took us an hour to find the hotel, but it was an

adventure, and we got to see a lot of pretty façades/interesting shops.

Interesting Things So Far:

- the architecture--there are a lot of beautifully painted façades (oranges, deep reds, pinks, bright yellows) with balconies protected by black iron fences. They are muy bonitas!

- there is a hilarious surplus of bridal shops

- there are orange trees EVERYWHERE. I think in the rain a lot of the oranges fell off so they are littering the streets. They look very pretty and yummy.

- NO8DO. I was seeing this written and on signs and banners everywhere I walked, so I looked it up on wikipedia (what a great tool). If wikipedia was telling me the truth, the 8 represents a madeja (a skein of yarn). When read as "no/madeja/do" it sounds a little like "no me ha dejado," which means "[Sevilla] has not abandoned me." I thought this was a really nice motto-it made me think that people here must feel a real kinship with their city, something I look forward to witnessing and hopefully experiencing myself!

That's all for now. It's time to get ready for dinner! (8:15 is still a little early for dinner here, but hey, I'm still adjusting).

Blail (blog fail)

Ok, I'm a blogging failure. I've tried to write a post many times, but to tell you the truth, it's a good thing that I didn't because it would have been boring. Since my last post, on November 4th, I have worked many more hours at the toy store (including holiday hours which were nightmarish), gone salsa dancing again a few times, spent time with old friends home from college for the holidays, packed for Spain (I'M LEAVING THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW) and gone through NBC withdrawal because of its month-long comedy hiatus.

So aren't you glad that I have neglected these gap year chronicles? Get ready for some real entries soon though. I will be in Seville, Spain from January 10th to May 15th, with a week-long pause somewhere in the middle there for my cousin's wedding.

Let me tell you right now what I am excited about and what I am nervous about.

EXCITED ABOUT:

- seeing/being a part of a beautiful city

- becoming fluent in Spanish

- eating (here's hoping that they like jamón serrano as much in Sevilla as they did in Madrid. This cured meat is so incredibly delicious!)

- being warmer than I am right now

- making new friends, both American and Spanish

- developing a relationship with my host family

- riding a camel on the trip to Morocco

NERVOUS ABOUT:

- failing to become fluent in Spanish

- eating fish, which doesn't agree with me but which I understand is a staple in southern Spain

- being placed with a host family with whom I do not get along

- falling off a camel on the trip to Morocco

Also, my brother Zander keeps telling me that I'm going to get sold into sex slavery. I was doing an okay job ignoring this horrible prophecy of his until I watched that movie Taken with Liam Neeson. Fun movie. Stupid brother.

Employee Discount: Friend or Foe? I'm going to go with foe. Yeah, definitely foe.

One of the perils of working retail is the employee discount. When you have one, you convince yourself that it is an awesome idea to spend money at your workplace. You're spending money, but because you're getting your stuff at a reduced price, you're saving money. One of the children's novels I read at work one day had a character who thought this way about shopping. She called her method "spaving" -- spend saving. Maybe it was my fondness for wombinations (word combinations, duh) that made me do a little "spaving" myself. Yesterday I spent about $45 at work, which is five hours-worth of wages (untaxed wages, mind you). I feel stupid because (a) even though I spent less than the average toy shopper would thanks to my trusty but evil employee discount, I spent way more than my store spent to get that stuff in the first place and because (b) that is $45 I could have spent on things that would make me grow smarter/more cultured or at least appear to grow smarter/more cultured. On the bright side, I have my advent calendar a month early and I am now the proud owner of some children's art supplies.

The gym wasn't so bad yesterday, although I was not prepared at all for the locker room. I'm not stupid--I knew there would be some changing, I just didn't expect there to be so much walking around and interacting while changing. Also, since when do people have to pay $2 for towels that are half the size of normal-human towels? I'm bringing my own towel from now on, you hear? That's really all for now.

Salsa Sundays & Seville

I wonder what makes someone obsessively write on (in?) his/her blog for the first week that he/she has it and then fail to write for the entire second week that he/she has it. Maybe it's because the second week of that person's life as a blogger (by the way, I'm talking about myself here) has been simple and quiet. Simple and quiet are fine and unobjectionable qualities in moderation, but nothing to write home (or on the internet) about.

However, there are four noteworthy life-plot-points that I will now make. Disclaimer: one of them is about television.

First, I joined a gym. 18+ years of self-examination have shown me that guilt-tripping is the most effective way to get me to do something, and I am now guilt-tripping myself into exercising. If I don't really make the most of my membership, it will be a tremendous waste of money. So tomorrow, I'm slipping on a pair shorts--ugh, how awful--and tackling the treadmill before work. Wish me luck, my 4 darling readers. You will all probably hear me complain about this experience tomorrow night.

My second update is that I went salsa dancing last night with a friend from work, which was a new experience for me! Before you write this off as pathetic, know this: I am an awful dancer. I really only have danced with people that I know really well--never in a room full of strangers who are mostly a decade or two older. We went to a restaurant downtown and heard a live band called Cinco Son play for a few hours, and over the course of the night my knees grew kind of sore (since when am I an octogenarian?) but I picked up some of the steps and had a ton of fun. I think that my first time going out dancing was, in many ways, a rite of passage. I would never describe myself as shy in general--I am usually quickly friendly when I meet new people--but I am crowd-shy, and noise-shy, and body-conscious, so going to Salsa Sundays was a little intimidating. Hopefully this gap year will be filled with many more intimidating, but ultimately fun and doable, experiences like this one.

Third, I am growing steadily more in love with NBC's Community. My boyfriend and I have been watching it together every weekend, and I like to play the clips with Abed and Troy over and over again, and he likes to make comments on what it says about my brain that this repetitiveness never bores me, and I like to ignore him and continue to appreciate Abed. I am so impressed by this character because in every episode so far, he has managed to break my heart a little bit and make me almost suffocate with laughter. He is so eager and sincere, and so, so, weird at the same time. He and the rest of the ensemble cast are worth watching, so if you're not already hooked, go catch up on Hulu!

Fourth, turns out I am the ONLY person enrolled in the gap year program in the Dominican Republic. So I might be going to Seville instead. Big development. Yes. But, I don't know that much about this big development yet, and it's past by bedtime (didn't I mention earlier that I am an octogenarian? Because I am, at heart.) Good night!

Banana Bread

Tonight, I made a loaf of banana bread, which is one of my favorite goodies to bake. In fact, it is in the oven right now, waiting to be taken out in the next fifteen minutes. It will be consumed tomorrow at the toy store's staff meeting (unless it's not any good, which would be embarrassing for me).

I might now emulate Julie Powell, famous author of the blog "The Julie/Julia Project" that was turned into a book--and then a movie, starring Meryl Streep and Amy Adams, which I am 99.9% sure will NOT happen with THIS blog--called Julie and Julia. I will emulate her by talking about cooking, and relating that to my life, which, like Julie's, feels wrong in some way.

There is a certain je ne sais quoi (that was an intentional allusion to Julie's story, by the way, since Julie and Julia are experiencing and writing, respectively, a French cookbook) that is making me feel very dissatisfied and uncomfortable lately. You know that scene in which Julie is eating lunch with her "friends" and they are all plugged into various electronic devices, moving swiftly through the afternoon and life, and she, unlike them, does not have some big important project about which she can gush? Fortunately, my friends are not bitches, like Julie's friends are, but I do feel like they are all growing up, moving through life, while my own situation is--and this is a situation for which I take full responsibility, by the way--regrettably stagnant.

So far, I am getting at least part of what I think I wanted out of this gap year: I am experiencing the "real world," I am not wasting a year's worth of tuition by freaking out about being away from home, and I am so bored that I am sure I will be eager to head off to college when next August rolls around. But I wasn't expecting when I chose to take a gap year that I would require an unsatisfying situation to make a wonderful opportunity--a college education--seem appealing. I was expecting that the tremendous maturity I would have to develop as a member of the American workforce would make college easier to face. Of course, I should have known that taking a job at a toy store would hardly make me grow more mature. I was also expecting that earning my own money for the first time in my life would make me feel independent (an important quality for college women!) but, I didn't realize how dependent I would feel living in my parents' house (you don't realize how infantilizing that is when you're in high school)...I also hoped that going off to DR would allow me to sack up and divorce myself from my home and my family a little bit. Hopefully, that still will happen, but that's not until January and this is October. But for now, the only thing that is preparing me for college is my increasing intolerance of where I am right now. And that is really, really too bad, both because that means I couldn't fully appreciate my college acceptance without lining it up next to something less desirable and because it means I have put myself in what is--at least for now--a highly unsatisfying situation.

But that brings me back to the banana bread. It made everything better tonight. It reminds me of my great friend Poppy, who taught me how to make it and wrote out the recipe for me on an uneven piece of cardboard from a case of Snapple. Thinking of her makes me happy; I have lots of happy memories with her, especially ones in the kitchen (we like to raid the fridge and we have made devil's food cake on more than one occasion). I also really admire her. I am sure college is burning her out, because it's burning out all my friends. But she is still strong, funny, and loving. She is a wonderful role model.

Now, I realize this is abrupt, but the banana bread is due to come out of the oven in two minutes. First let me just share another reason I like making banana bread. It smells good when it's baking, and it tastes really, really good once it's cooled. Bon appétit!

An unkind kindle

...as I expected, I did not win the Amazon Kindle. However, the fundraiser was incredibly successful. My boss wants to raise a full scholarship--a $25,000 scholarship, to be exact--so that one more student can attend our school. We expected this to be a low-grossing night; it was intended more to reach out to people who would like to support us/volunteer with us but can't afford to attend the much more expensive fundraiser we hold in the spring. However, we raised almost $1,000!

I've held off for two whole posts without discussing television in-depth, although I certainly have been trying to prepare my readers for the TV overload that is sure to pop up from time to time, i.e. every other day, with little hints such as "I am an NBC junkie" (see "Two months in" from 10/20). So, get ready for the first TV rant.

NOTE: I tend to talk more about my feelings when it comes to television than about the artistic qualities of the medium itself. If you want to see some witty and humorous commentary/intellectual analysis, check out my friend Liz's blog, Remote Nomad (cool name, right?) which is devoted entirely to television. We watch almost all the same shows, except that she watches Mad Men and More to Love and I do not, while I watch what I call the Holy Trinity--or Triumphant Triumvirate--of NBC (30 Rock, The Office, & Community) and she does not. She's a smart cookie and this is a good blog. Trust me.

WARNING: The following contains Brothers and Sisters as well as Gossip Girl spoilers.

So here is what I am feeling right about now. Let's start off with Brothers and Sisters. Why does Kitty have cancer? Totally unnecessary heart-wrencher. I hate it when television creates needless pain just to keep you watching (although, I have to hand it to TV writers; it works). That's what makes dramas "jump the shark," and when it is obvious to viewers that they are being subjected to drama for drama's sake, they (we) get annoyed. Which reminds me of Gossip Girl. Having Chuck and Blair (or, as I have dubbed them, "Bluck") break up is like a slap in the face to the loyal fans who patiently waited through Nate/Blair attempt number 3 (or "Blait III") for Bluck to blossom. Blergh!

I'm officially embarrassed about my long rant, but to be honest with you, dear readers, this was very cathartic for me. Thank you.