Oh the People You'll Meet

"Oh the places you'll go! Oh the people you'll meet!...

You have brains in your head.You have feet in your shoes.You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go.... "-Dr Seuss

As I come to the close of this trip I have begun to realize that my favorite thing has been all the people I have met. People from all walks of life, people from all different countries... learning a new language opens up another part of the world that you would never have met if the language barrier still stood in your way. Most of the people I've met know more than one language and it usually includes English or Spanish. I was talking with one guy who listed off the languages he knew: Spanish, English, French, Italian, German, and Arabic and then looked at me inquiringly, "How many do you speak?" When I admitted to 'only' two he asserted that I was still young. He's right. Heck, why not learn more languages? But anyway, back to the people:

- A Spanish sailor taught me how to cuss in spanish holding to the saying "cussing like a sailor"

-I hung out with a group of French girls a couple nights in a row and had more fun with them than my American girl friends

-I hung out with a couple from Ireland and we discussed the antics of Harry Potter

-I had a conversation with an Italian while I spoke spanish and he spoke italian and I think we actually understood each other

-I laughed with a little guy from Cambodia for no particular reason

-I hung out with guys from Germany who are middle eastern descent and we discussed politics

-I've tagged along with a couple of British stag parties

-I have more Spanish friends than I can keep track of

-I go to "the barrio" with one friend and leave with anywhere between 2-20 more

One of the greatest things I can take away from this trip is that it's okay to talk to people, actually it's great. The more international friends you have the greater your understanding of the world around you. So get out there and meet someone new today.

Barcelona and the book that led us there

So once upon a time I had this pretty sweet spanish teacher in high school. Before I left I told him I was going to Spain and he mailed me the book he used when he last traveled to Spain. I didn´t think much of it until last weekend when it saved my life...

There I was sitting in class learning about Pretérito Imperfecto de Subjunctivo and fuming at a certain he who must not be named. My phone lit up with a text message: "Sorry love, can´t make it down there this weekend I´m snowed in at work." I softly cursed the Brits under my breath and then turned coyly to my lovely friend Lori who was staring blankly at the conjugated verbs on the board. "Soooooooo Lori..." She grunted something to acknowledge she had heard me and then I said quickly "Wanna catch the next train to Barcelona and get out of here?" She nodded in agreement and after class we found Nicole.

-"Nicole, we´re going to Barcelona."

-"When?"

-"Now."

-"Oh"

Nicole took a little more persuading but I took the bus home, ran inside, and found Zoeller´s book. I used it to find everything we needed and four hours later we were standing at the train station buying our tickets for the next morning.

I have to say, Barcelona is pretty sweet. Without the book we would have been completely lost. We had maps of all the different parts of town, a map of the metro, had found a Hostal close to La Rambla, and were able to find all the cool places to see.

When we got there we wandered down La Rambla taking in all the street performers, then rode to the top of the Cristobal Colon monument to see all of Barcelona at once. From there we hopped on the met and quickly found the Picasso Museum. The museum was awesome because you start at the beginning of his career before he goes all weird and then each room is the next period of his life. My favorite was his study on Las Meninas in case you have any idea of what I´m talking about. We used the book to find the most popular restaurant close to us called... El Quinte Nit... or something.. I can´t speak catalun so half the time I had no idea what the signs said. I finally learned that the language I am learning is called Castellano. Es el mejor. Anyway, the hostal we were in was really nice. Apparently you can´t book one of the hostals where you sleep with strangers at the last minute. Instead you get a personal room and bath with three twin beds shoved in there and you have the most comfortable nights sleep yet. Who knew?

The next day we went straight to La Sagrada Familia. It was incredible. It was one of those instances where you don´t really know what to expect so when you get there you just stare openmouthed and blinking rapidly kind of like a frog. Then you take more pictures then you will ever need of it, but it´s okay because you have a digital camera and you can delete all of the unnecessary ones later. We walked down L'Eixample seeing more of Gaudi´s work and stopping in little cafés to eat chocolate filled croissants. We were moved into an apartment because the hostal couldn´t find us another room (darn it?) so we HAD to sleep in a giant feather bed all together with our own kitchen and bathroom. After we "moved in" we headed to the history museum which I had found in the book, but hadn´t read the description. So, we get there and head to the first room,`politely looking at the ancient artifacts and then we can´t find the rest of the museum. I find an elevator and we all climb inside.

-"Uh, guys?"

-"Yeah?"

-"There are only two buttons. One says 'Barcelona' and the other says 'Barcino'.. what do I do?"

-"Just push one."

So I do and the elevator starts going down and a disembodied voice tells us that we are now going back in time. We get off and a whole Roman city lays in ruins before our feet. It was by far the coolest museum EVER! We were able to walk through the whole city on suspended glass platforms so we could see everything and we had an audio tour guide that was able to tell us a lot too. Above (when we got back to Barcelona from Barcino) we found ourselves in the throne room where Ferdinand and Isabel received Columbus after his journey to America. Sometimes... history can be reallly cool.

For good measure we went to the nearby chocolate museum. After we went and changed then headed to a Flamenco show. I had never seen anything more passionate in my life. A woman sitting next to Lori had burst into tears halfway through one of the songs. I swear on my life I will never be able to appreciate another guitar player ever again unless he can play some darn good spanish guitar. AND dancers of the tango and tap have got NOTHING on Flamenco dancers. I was very impressed.

The night proved to be fruitless besides the fact that Lori got an egg thrown at her and I got proposed to by a very hairy German man and Nicole was asked three times if she was Jamaican (which she is) by three different Jamaican men.

Overall the trip was very successful. I am no longer mad at the men in my life.. at least not the British ones (ahem, Adam) and we never would have gotten anywhere with our spontaneousness if it had not been for Zoeller´s book.. which we call simply: The Bible. So, thanks Zoeller for thinking of me. Someday I will send you something random in the mail and it will prove useful months down the road.

Oh and thank you to Lori and Nicole who go along with my impulsiveness when I need them the most:

For more pics: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2027116&l=de4de&id=23709871

Mi Hermanito, Goyo

It´s amazing how much you can learn from a 7 year old. This kid is way fun. Here´s a video of him dancing/ demonstrating the fact that I taught him how to say "Rock, paper, scissors, SHOOT"

http://s77.photobucket.com/albums/j79/LittleHazel/?action=view&current=fdd7ec9b.flv

Top 10 Reasons Why Dad Should Let Me Become a Sailor

10. After having lived in Spain, America is going to seem very boring to me, and I´ll need something to keep myself occupied.

9. Sailing builds character, and I just decided I don´t have enough of that.

8. Though I have received a lot of life experience here in Spain, I could gain even more life experiences being a sailor and thus have more to write about.

7. If I have more to write about I will be a more successful writer, can publish a best seller and buy dad his own 50 foot sailboat.

6. I will be able to learn even more languages and see even more of the world.

5. I will be humbled. Especially if I start out as a deck hand.

4. From experience, sailors are very unreliable people, they need someone like me to whip them into shape.

3. Also from experience, I know that sailors usually don´t have set goals for themselves. They just drop out of high school and start sailing because that´s all they want to do with their lives. I could set a better example for them.

2. I have come to not even like sailors very much, which depresses me, and the only way to repair this is to become a sailor myself and thus change my opinion.

1. And most importantly, so everyone can continue living vicariously through me.

Mi Vida en España

I´ve moved in with a Spanish family and it has been awesome. I live with a woman who´s about 50 named Marisa and her 7 year old son, Goyo. Before I moved in I was really worried. I´m used to living on my own at this point and it´s a more comfortable situation to be with other Americans anyway. By the second day I felt like it was a home I had never left. I fit right in with the two of them constantly teasing each other. I already know the city so I don´t need to rely on them too much for anything except for the constant Spanish. I just learned yesterday that apparently Marisa can speak English but our director, Luis, told her to not speak to me in English at all because he thinks I know enough Spanish where it´s not necessary. It took me a week to figure this out. BUt in that week I have learned SO much more Spanish at a faster pace than I was learning at school. Before you could go to school all day, but when you went home you´d still be among other Americans and you would speak English. Now I learn something at school and I´m able to go home and practice what I´ve learned. It´s so fun. Talking to Goyo is awesome too because he has a simpler way of talking and a simpler way of explaining everything. I come home and I have food waiting for me for lunch, and then I get dinner later around 9:30. She does my laundry and she even cleaned my room once. Mom says to not get used to it. OH and for the first couple days Goyo took advantage of the language barrier and cheated in every game we played until I finally learned the word "Tramposo" and now I win everything... he never wants to play as much anymore...

Las Hogueras

I do not have words in English or in Spanish to describe this night. Las Hogueras is a festival in Alicante that celebrates the summer solstice, the shortest night of the year. I read a poem where the man refers to it as ¨the night that is converted into day.¨ At the beginning of the festival, beautiful statues are built around the city. There are about 86. Some of them are over 15 feet tall. For four days the city celebrates with a wake up call at 8:00 in the morning (marching bands and firecrackers down every street), mascletas in the afternoon (the loudest fireworks show you will ever hear), parades for the rest of the day, and then barracas all night long (dance parties in the streets). The whole city is awake for the entire weekend. And then Sunday night is when it all ends. Literally, with a bang.

So we prepared ourselves: tennis shoes and bathing suits under our clothes, and at midnight we were at the beach. Everyone waited until finally the palmera was shot off from the top of the castle. The most beautiful firework I have ever seen! It announced that the night had officially begun and we were off running down the street towards the ayuntamiento (town hall) where the official hoguera stood. The amount of people surrounding the beautiful statue was suffocating and then suddenly fireworks began going off around and off of the statue itself, which was doused in gasoline, and the whole thing took to flames. You felt the heat on your face and soon we noticed people ducking and moving out of the way. We looked up, hot ash was falling from the sky. The firemen went to work, and so did the crowd, taunting them with namecalling and chants for "Agua!" Soon, the firemen´s hoses were turned on the crowd with an uproar of cheers, but we didn´t feel the water because we were running up the street once again towards another calle, for another hoguera. This one was less crowded and we got front row seats. When the hoguera lit, we all jumped back a couple feet because the fire was so intense. This time when the hoses were finally turned on the crowd we were drenched in no time. We ran and found our barrio´s hoguera. There we watched it burn to the end.

We ran back to the apartment (by this time we had run over a mile that night) and changed into dry clothes. We found our neighbors and headed to the barracas for some dancing. We danced until 5:00 in the morning at which point we headed to the beach. We found one of our spanish friends there and sat talking with him until the sun rose over the beach. We learned later that you are not fully purified from the night unless you see the sun rise, so don´t worry guys, I´m pure. I think we finally went to bed around 8:00.

Más fotos: http://unlv.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2025611&l=8ab69&id=23709871

And how was your summer solstice? I hope you didn´t miss it!

Making Hemingway´s Spain My Spain

There is a saying here in Spain that goes ¨Leer es Vivir dos veces" This translates in English to "To read is to live two times." I read Hemingway, but now I´m living Hemingway too. I went to my first bullfight yesterday with a group of about seven girls. They all cried when the first bull died, but I loved watching the fight. Four of the girls left after the first three bulls, but I stayed. I understood when the bull was putting up a good fight, when it had good breeding, and when it was just a stupid animal. I understood when the matador in turn understood the bull and what he would do next, and I understood when everytging the matador did was just for show. I could pick the brave from the cowards and I observed how as the final sword was driven into the spine of the bull the picadors came up waving their capes on either side of the bull until it kneeled down at the feet of the matador in defeat. The bull´s last sight was usually the matador standing triumphant over it. I was able to understand the fight because it was as if Hemingway had explained it to me. Thus, after the second bull went down I understood that this was an excellent fight and I rose to my feet with the other spainards and waved my fan in a sign to present the matador with the bull´s ear as the other girls looked on dumbfounded. I liked the bull fight. Not many people do. But I take it as a representation of man´s ablity to overcome fear, to take on something so much bigger than itself and do so with a sort of majestic grace.

Something went terribly wrong with the last bull. It was bigger than the rest, and smarter too. It understood more than the other bulls had. So, when the gates opened to let the horses through, the bull made a run for it. He rammed the gate open and gored the man behind the gate. The man was taken and passed up through the crowd like a bloody rag doll and disappeared from view. A few moments passed where we were all on our feet. The silence was broken by hushed whispers and then a riderless horse came flying into the stadium pushed through the gate by the angry bull. The picadors went to work and the matador came out for the final fight. The bull gave up early in the fight, but had won his first battle. The man is still alive. The paper today said he´s in the general hospital in critical condition. I wish I could tell you more, but reading the newspaper in spanish is still not one of my strong points.