After Locutorio Al Noor on Tuesday, I hoofed it back to the hotel to make it there by 6:30 p.m. for dinner. I asked Gary if we could run to see San Antonio de la Florida, the chapel whose ceilings Goya painted, before dinner. It is open until 8 p.m., and it would be the only chance to see it for those who were leaving the next morning. He gave me the go-ahead, and ten travelers followed me down the street at a pretty good clip. (First we took a picture of the entire group with Gary, like we had with Ricardo. I´m going to post it later.) The chapel was worth the sprint. It was recently restored to its original splendor, and it is glorious. In addition to the beautiful ceilings, Goya is buried there. (We can add Goya´s tomb to the others we have seen on this trip: El Cid, Christopher Columbus, Isabel and Ferdinand. Not a bad collection of bones!) We laid on the floor on our backs to get the full effect. Magnificent. His angels were my favorites, even though San Antonio, our city´s patron saint, got premium placement. (The chapel is named for him, after all.) I also think that of all the Goya paintings I´ve seen, including his most famous ones in El Prado, his painting of this chapel is my favorite. We couldn´t take photos, and they didn´t have postcards for sale, so you´ll have to take my word for it.
After our quick visit, we ran back down to the Principe Pio metro station and jumped on a metro to La Plaza de España. We had dinner at DuDua on Calle Cuesta San Vicente, number 2. Kim said, ¨Oh, oh. This restaurant doesn´t sound very promising. Doo-doo. Number two.¨ I cracked up. Potty humor. You can tell we´re tired/giddy from so much running around and lack of sleep. We were only 15 minutes late. Not bad. Dinner wasn´t bad, but it wasn´t great. Dessert was the best. Some sort of tiramisu treat. Aedan didn´t leave a speck of that on her plate. We bid farewell to the Alaska group, who was taking off the next morning at the crack of dawn, and seven of our San Antonio travelers (Sonia, Kim, Liz, Marsha, Alma, Valerie and Ish). We were sorry to see them go.
After dinner, we got back on the metro to Principe Pio. Chloe, one of the Alaskan girls, had gotten permanent tattoes above each ankle that day. One is of the Eye of Horis and the other of an Egyptian ank. I asked Chloe if she´d seen the Templo de Debod, yet, and she hadn´t. I told her that she had to since she´s so crazy about Egypt, and I think this temple is more amazing than the one at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. So, Mother, Blair, Aedan, Chloe, Carly and Monica (more Alaskan friends) hiked up to the temple. (It looked much closer on the map than it was, but it was worth it.) We took pictures of us posing like Egyptians (bent elbows), and took in the beautiful sunset. Besides viewing a 2,200 year old Egyptian temple in an outdoor park setting, you also get to view young couples making out like crazy. Splendor in the grass. My mother´s eyebrows were up to her hairline. PDAs (public displays of affection) are the norm here in Madrid, and I´m sure that Franco is spinning in his grave. I think it´s rather humorous. Or should I say amorous?!
Yesterday (Wednesday) we had breakfast in the hotel, and we got to say goodbye to our seven departing travelers. Kim said, ¨I feel like we ought to be giving you a tip envelope.¨ (We´ve given or are giving tips to Gary, our guide, and Ricardo, our driver.) That cracked me up. My ¨tip¨ is the pure enjoyment this group has had, and their appreciation for the work Mariana and I have put in to make the trip enjoyable. After breakfast, Blair, Aedan and I went to Retiro Park (sort of like New York´s Central Park) to ride the row boats. When Blair was in college at Kansas State, he was on the crew team, so he´s quite a rower. For just over 4 Euros, you can paddle for 45 minutes around El Estanque Grande (big pond) of Retiro Park. Alfonso XII´s masoleum overlooks the pond, and it´s very impressive. I took video of Aedan and Blair rowing that I´ll post later. I recommend this activity to anyone who visits Madrid. Very peaceful. (At least for the boat´s passengers!) After rowing, we walked over to El Palacio Cristal, the Crystal Palace, a gorgeous all-glass building. I loved visiting it when I lived in Madrid, and it still gives me a thrill to see it.
After Retiro, we walked over to the Thyssen to buy tickets for the Van Gogh exhibit. Mother and Casey had already seen it, and Mother said it was incredible. The show features the last two years of Van Gogh´s work, and I´m a huge fan of his art. We secured tickets for today (Thursday) at 11 a.m. (The museum only lets so many people at one time so there isn´t a crush of people all at once.) I left Aedan and Blair at the museum and took the metro to my family´s home, where I had left pralines for our friends at Suffolk. (Blair and Aedan had lunch near La Puerta del Sol without me. (Aedan grabbed a Happy Meal at McD´s...only her third for the trip!...and Blair grabbed a picnic para llevar (to go picnic) at El Museo de Jamon. For less than 2 Euros, you get a ham or cheese sandwich, an apple or an orange, and a beer or soft drink! They ate in the park near the Cathedral on the way back to our hotel.) I met Mariana, my Palo Alto colleague, and Cristina, our 2003, 2004 and 2005 Madrid study abroad coordinator, at Suffolk University at 1:30 p.m., and Cristina took us to lunch around the corner. It was a delicious lunch. Cristina explained that the owner/chef is from Cuba, and she is a great cook. No lie. I had arroz a la Cubana for my first plate (sort of like huevos rancheros, but served with sticky white rice), broiled salmon for my second plate, and melt-in-your-mouth cherries for my third plate (postre). Heaven! Cristina, whose last week at Suffolk is this week after 10 years of die-hard service, brought us up to date on her future plans and her family. We hope she travels to San Antonio in the near future! I know we are going to stay in touch with her. She´s family.
From the restaurant, I walked over to the Moncloa metro. Memories! When we lived in Madrid in 2004, our apartment was nearby, so Moncloa was our metro stop. The trip to Principe Pio was quick, and when I got back to the hotel I hit the bed for a siesta...just like a true Spaniard. When I awoke, Blair had been to the store and bought rations for a pre-dinner happy hour: papas fritas (potato chips), aceitunas (olives, with and without pits), and cerveza (Mahou, a local beer). What a nice wake up! Mother and Casey joined us for their last night in Madrid. They were going to take a night train to Portugal for a couple of days. (They´ll take a night train back to Madrid on Saturday night, so we´ll see them again on Sunday. We all leave for the States on Monday. SIGH. Can you tell we´re having a lot of fun and don´t really want to come home? I always feel that way when it´s time to leave Spain. I asked Blair if he thought he could live here some day, and he said as long as he was with me. What an answer! What a guy! I don´t know if he was pulling my leg, but it made me feel good.)
We met up with the group at 6:30 p.m. in the hotel´s lobby before grabbing another metro to Plaza de España to eat at the nearby Museo del Jamon. (Madrid boasts several locations. Blair´s lunch was from La Plaza Mayor location, and he couldn´t believe that he was having lunch and dinner at El Museo del Jamon in one day....but as Daisann McClane´s article in ¨The New York Times¨ reports, ¨In Madrid, there is no such thing as too much ham¨. Oddly enough, there was not a hint of ham at our dinner. Our first plate was pasta, our second plate was salad with tuna, boiled eggs and white asparagus, and our third plate was ice cream. (After my huge lunch and hefty happy hour, I was stuffed. Steve polished off my pasta, and I didn´t eat a bit of the salad. I did, however, eat the ice cream. Who can turn down ice cream? Not me. Especially not after climbing the 153 steps up at La Plaza de España metro stop. I counted them this time. I must be getting in better shape. I was still winded, but I wasn´t dead. I didn´t run up them like Miles did, though. I still can´t believe that. Oh, to be 18 and in shape!)
After dinner, Blair, Aedan and I strolled over to San Gines for yet another cup of chocolate. Blair and Aedan split an order of churros. I was still full so I didn´t eat any, but I made myself drink the chocolate. (Who can pass up chocolate from San Gines? Not me. Never.) When we lived here in 2004, we bought several bars (sort of like giant Hershey bars) of chocolate in El Corte Ingles´ grocery store, hoping to replicate the chocolate at San Gines. No luck. We were sorely disappointed. I asked our waiter if San Gines sold bars of chocolate. He said they sold their chocolate, but it wasn´t in bars. It´s polvo (powder). EUREKA! He said that you mix the polvo in a liter (about a quart) of milk. We snapped up four boxes (cost= 4 Euros a box), and we probably will wish we had bought more. Maybe they´ll ship it to us when we run out?
We took the metro back to the hotel from Opera, just a hop, skip and a jump away. When we got home, I spoke with Mari, our neighbor from 2004, and she invited us to lunch at their new house in the country on Sunday. We are looking forward to seeing them! We collapsed at 11:30 p.m., because we knew we had to wake up early for today´s activities.
We met at my Spanish family's home at 9 a.m. for breakfast. (We wanted to see them before our 11 a.m. entrance into the Thyssen for the Van Gogh exhibit.) It was the first time Blair and Aedan had met Maricarmen, one of my five sisters, who married a Puerto Rican-American and lives in New Jersey with her husband and twin daughters, Samantha and Silvia, who are 8. Aedan loved meeting them and getting reacquainted with Willie, another sister´s (Elena´s) son, who is the same age, 10, as Aedan. They played like they´d always known each other. I know Aedan was happy to finally be around people her own age. We had a nice breakfast, which brought back lots of memories of my year that I lived with Pilar, Paco and their daughters. The kitchen is bigger now. They rennovated it, making it wider. (They got rid of some closets to make extra space.) It´s very nice. Maria said that the rennovation was like building El Escorial, the palace outside of Madrid. It took forever. (Maria, like Pilar, cracks me up. I like the way they see things. When I told Maricarmen that my 71-year-old mother has a 72-year-old boyfriend, Pilar said, ¨Logico!¨(Logical! with a dead serious face.)
We left their piso to catch the metro over to the Thyssen Museum. We got in right away to the Van Gogh exhibit, which was small but over the top. His ¨Landscape at Twilight¨ brought tears to my eyes. It is amazingly beautiful, and I had never seen it before. It´s in the permanent collection of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, but when my sister and I were there in 1990, we weren´t able to go. (Seems like the museum was closed at the time for some reason.) I´m so glad I got to see it and his other work now. When I turned around, what should be hanging but one of the McNay Museum of Arts´pieces (¨Women Crossing the Fields¨)!!! I ran over to it and exclaimed to the guy next to me, ¨Es de mi pueblo! San Antonio, Texas.¨ He said, with a British accent, ¨So you are American?¨ I said that I was, and that it was a thrill to see a painting that I´d ¨visited¨ many times in my hometown here at the Thyssen. We started visiting, and turns out that he lives on the Canary Islands. He knew that Canary Islanders were the founders of San Antonio, and he said that he was going to send me some information via snail mail. The reason why Joe, as he asked me to call him, has a British accent is that he was born in Gibraltar, a British colony on the tip of Africa that once belonged to Spain. Everyone who lives there is bilingual (Spanish and English...and maybe trilingual, French, or quadlingual, Arabic). He said that he´s lived on the Canary Islands for more than 40 years now. I told him that I´d like to visit there someday. We´re going to have to plan a trip to visit our friends from graduate school who live in Rabat, Morocco, by way of the Canaries, which are off the coast of Morocco, now that we´ve made all of these Canary contacts on this trip!
The entire exhibit was fenomenal (phenomenal), and I bought a poster to hang in my office at work to remind me of the ¨piel de gallina¨ (chicken skin...a.k.a. goosebumps) experience. From the special exhibit, we made our way through the Thyssen´s permanent exhibit, which isn´t shabby. In fact, it´s tremendous. I like the way the museum is set out. You begin with the museum´s medieval collection and walk your way through the ages to its modern collection. You feel like you´ve been in a time-travelling machine. Degas´ paintings of ballerinas in beautiful green costumes and polo players in brightly colored outfits are my favorite paintings in the museum´s permanent collection. We saw them in 2004, and I was happy to see them again.
After the museum, we strolled over to La Puerta del Sol to pick up three more picnics para llevar. Aedan and Blair both got bocadillos de queso (cheese sandwiches), but I got a bocadillo de jamon. (There´s no such thing as too much, remember?) We sat on the steps leading down to the Calle Felipe III in La Plaza Mayor and ate our picnic feast. After lunch, we did a little shopping in La Plaza Mayor, which is filled with souvenir shops. We picked up a ¨History of Bread¨ tile for Blair, who baked 100 loaves of the New York Times´ ¨No-Knead Bread¨ before leaving for Spain. We also picked up a few other trinkets to bring home before taking the metro back to our hotel. Blair and Aedan are hanging out in the room while I write this blog. We´re meeting up with the group at 6:30 again. After dinner, we´re going back to my Spanish family´s home to see two more sisters, Silvia and Beatriz. (It´s difficult to organize visits with so many people with different work schedules and who now live in their own homes!)
Tomorrow, we´re thinking about going to Segovia. We can grab a bus right next to our hotel that´ll get us there in an hour. Aedan doesn´t want to go, but Blair and I may overrule her. We visited there in 2004, but it was a rushed visit. We didn´t get to go inside of the Alcazar, the castle, which is stunningly beautiful. It´s obvious that we´re not going to get to do everything we want to do in the time that remains. The only solution is a return trip!
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Madrid, Spain
We´re back in Madrid, and it feels good to be ¨home¨! Our trip from Sevilla via Cordoba and Puerto Lapice was a long day, but it was a beautiful ride. Spain is such a gorgeous country: rolling hills--some planted, some harvested--that look like quilt designs; blue skies, white-washed homes with terracotta roofs, stereotypical windmills that juxtapose nicely with the new ¨windtricity¨ windmills, olive groves, and on and on.
When we got to Cordoba, we had some free time before our tour of La Mezquita. Mother, Casey, Blair, Aedan, Kim and I wound our way through narrow, cobblestone streets to a place my ¨Let´s Go Spain and Portugal¨ guidebook recommended. (Casey said that he hoped someone was dropping breadcrumbs so we could find our way back.) The Casa Andalusi is a 12th-century Arabesque home and courtyard that has been beautifully restored. The flower-filled fountain alone was worth the price of admission, 2.5 Euros. Very soothing environment. Educational, too. The home features a mini museum of paper-making, which was big in Cordoba back in the day. The words written on the handmade paper helped to educate and inform the masses.
La Mezquita was as stunning as I remembered from my trip in the spring of 1982. Like La Alhambra, it´s a blessing that the Catholic kings didn´t raze the building after Cordoba was conquered, because the Moors had razed a Visigoth basilica on that very site when they took over Cordoba. La Mezquita is now a Gothic cathedral built around the original mosque, which was the largest mosque in the Islamic world at that time (eighth century). The 850 columns made out of granite and marble feature red- and white-striped arches. It´s a wonder to walk through them. A home in San Antonio´s King William neighborhood sports these same arches, and I´m always reminded of La Mezquita when I see it.
From Cordoba, we watched the end of ¨El Cid¨ with Charlton Heston and Sofia Loren. (We´d watched the first half on our way to Sevilla.) Long, but good. I´d like to watch it again. The tiny screen on the bus didn´t do the film justice. We then stopped in Puerto Lapice, one of Don Quixote´s hangouts. It´s a pretty sleepy little town filled with tourist traps. I stopped to ask some local men who were hanging out in the town square where the molinos del aire (windmills) were, and they told Mother, Blair, Aedan and I to keep walking through the town and turn left. When we got there, we found Steve. Richard wasn´t far behind us. We all posed for pictures, our only souvenir from P.L.
The ride from P.L. to Madrid wasn´t long. As we entered Madrid, we traveled via an underground tunnel that was recently completed. It was extremely long. I asked Ricardo, our bus driver, how long he thought it was, and he said eight or more kilometers. When we exited the tunnel, we were very close to our hotel, Celuisma Florida Norte, which is in a super location, just across from the old North Train Station (Estacion del Norte) that is now a mall. The view of the Cathedral is stunning from the hotel. We dropped our bags in our rooms, ran back downstairs to take a picture with Ricardo, and give him his much-deserved tip (propina). We found out on the last day that he´s got two children, a male, 16, and a female, 11. I don´t know how they cope with him being on the road for so long, but he said they´re going to the Canary Islands for a vacation as soon as he returns.
We had dinner near La Puerta del Sol in a restaurant called, Taberna Marciano (the martian tavern). The food was excellent: paella, tortilla española, sangria and neopolitan ice cream. What´s not to like about that? After dinner, Kim, Casey, Mother, Miles (an Alaskan friend), Aedan and I walked over to Chocolateria San Gines for some chocolate con churros. The link I posted calls the chocolate there mythical, and they are not mistaken. It was Kim´s first visit to San Gines, and I told her that this chocolate will be something she dreams about when she´s back in San Antonio.
We walked over to La Plaza Mayor, a stone´s throw away from San Gines, after we were fortified with chocolate. The weather is absolutely lovely right now in Madrid. Coolish and no mosquitoes. Mariana, the transnochera (trans equals across or through and nochera equals night) stayed behind, but the rest of us walked back to our hotel via La Calle Mayor, past the Cathedral, down through a park until we hit the river. We then took a right to Principe Pio, the hotel´s location. Aedan talked non-stop to Miles the whole way back to the hotel. Maybe a heaping serving of dark chocolate at 9 p.m. wasn´t the best idea? She was wound up. Miles was charming, though, and listened to every one of her stories. (BTW, Miles is a trick skier. When we walked up endless steps---and I do mean endless---to the top of our metro stop, he ran up. I was nearly dead when I got to the top, and he hadn´t even broken a sweat.)
Today´s been a lazy day. No early wake-up call. We just took it easy. Aedan has been enjoying Japanese anime (cartoons) on television that are voiced over in Spanish. Blair´s learning how to play castanets. The Centro Comercial Principe Pio across from the hotel is beautiful. Lots of interesting shops and a big food court. We had lunch and then strolled through the mall. We bought some colorful socks that were made in Turkey for Aedan at H&M, a cool department store that I wish we had in the U.S. It carries stylish things that are reasonably priced. Aedan and Blair went back to the hotel so that I could blog at this Internet center down the street from our hotel. It´s a very clean place of business, and it only costs 1 Euro an hour to get online, the least expensive price I´ve been charged so far on this adventure. The name of the business is Al Noor Locutorio, and it´s on Vallodolid, 9. The guy at the desk is Muslim, and he´s playing Arabic music that at times sounds like prayers. Maybe they are? The only creepy thing is that there´s a videocamera pointed at me as I write this blog, and every once in awhile it flashes, like it´s taking a picture of me. After a couple of flashes, I turned the camera to the back wall. Too Big Brothery for me.
Tomorrow, Mariana and I are going to meet with our friends at Suffolk University´s Madrid campus at 1:30 p.m. (We hosted Palo Alto´s Spain Study Abroad program there in 2003, 2004 and 2005. It will be great to see everyone.) After today, we only have five days left in Spain, and we have LOTS of ground to cover. Stay with us!
When we got to Cordoba, we had some free time before our tour of La Mezquita. Mother, Casey, Blair, Aedan, Kim and I wound our way through narrow, cobblestone streets to a place my ¨Let´s Go Spain and Portugal¨ guidebook recommended. (Casey said that he hoped someone was dropping breadcrumbs so we could find our way back.) The Casa Andalusi is a 12th-century Arabesque home and courtyard that has been beautifully restored. The flower-filled fountain alone was worth the price of admission, 2.5 Euros. Very soothing environment. Educational, too. The home features a mini museum of paper-making, which was big in Cordoba back in the day. The words written on the handmade paper helped to educate and inform the masses.
La Mezquita was as stunning as I remembered from my trip in the spring of 1982. Like La Alhambra, it´s a blessing that the Catholic kings didn´t raze the building after Cordoba was conquered, because the Moors had razed a Visigoth basilica on that very site when they took over Cordoba. La Mezquita is now a Gothic cathedral built around the original mosque, which was the largest mosque in the Islamic world at that time (eighth century). The 850 columns made out of granite and marble feature red- and white-striped arches. It´s a wonder to walk through them. A home in San Antonio´s King William neighborhood sports these same arches, and I´m always reminded of La Mezquita when I see it.
From Cordoba, we watched the end of ¨El Cid¨ with Charlton Heston and Sofia Loren. (We´d watched the first half on our way to Sevilla.) Long, but good. I´d like to watch it again. The tiny screen on the bus didn´t do the film justice. We then stopped in Puerto Lapice, one of Don Quixote´s hangouts. It´s a pretty sleepy little town filled with tourist traps. I stopped to ask some local men who were hanging out in the town square where the molinos del aire (windmills) were, and they told Mother, Blair, Aedan and I to keep walking through the town and turn left. When we got there, we found Steve. Richard wasn´t far behind us. We all posed for pictures, our only souvenir from P.L.
The ride from P.L. to Madrid wasn´t long. As we entered Madrid, we traveled via an underground tunnel that was recently completed. It was extremely long. I asked Ricardo, our bus driver, how long he thought it was, and he said eight or more kilometers. When we exited the tunnel, we were very close to our hotel, Celuisma Florida Norte, which is in a super location, just across from the old North Train Station (Estacion del Norte) that is now a mall. The view of the Cathedral is stunning from the hotel. We dropped our bags in our rooms, ran back downstairs to take a picture with Ricardo, and give him his much-deserved tip (propina). We found out on the last day that he´s got two children, a male, 16, and a female, 11. I don´t know how they cope with him being on the road for so long, but he said they´re going to the Canary Islands for a vacation as soon as he returns.
We had dinner near La Puerta del Sol in a restaurant called, Taberna Marciano (the martian tavern). The food was excellent: paella, tortilla española, sangria and neopolitan ice cream. What´s not to like about that? After dinner, Kim, Casey, Mother, Miles (an Alaskan friend), Aedan and I walked over to Chocolateria San Gines for some chocolate con churros. The link I posted calls the chocolate there mythical, and they are not mistaken. It was Kim´s first visit to San Gines, and I told her that this chocolate will be something she dreams about when she´s back in San Antonio.
We walked over to La Plaza Mayor, a stone´s throw away from San Gines, after we were fortified with chocolate. The weather is absolutely lovely right now in Madrid. Coolish and no mosquitoes. Mariana, the transnochera (trans equals across or through and nochera equals night) stayed behind, but the rest of us walked back to our hotel via La Calle Mayor, past the Cathedral, down through a park until we hit the river. We then took a right to Principe Pio, the hotel´s location. Aedan talked non-stop to Miles the whole way back to the hotel. Maybe a heaping serving of dark chocolate at 9 p.m. wasn´t the best idea? She was wound up. Miles was charming, though, and listened to every one of her stories. (BTW, Miles is a trick skier. When we walked up endless steps---and I do mean endless---to the top of our metro stop, he ran up. I was nearly dead when I got to the top, and he hadn´t even broken a sweat.)
Today´s been a lazy day. No early wake-up call. We just took it easy. Aedan has been enjoying Japanese anime (cartoons) on television that are voiced over in Spanish. Blair´s learning how to play castanets. The Centro Comercial Principe Pio across from the hotel is beautiful. Lots of interesting shops and a big food court. We had lunch and then strolled through the mall. We bought some colorful socks that were made in Turkey for Aedan at H&M, a cool department store that I wish we had in the U.S. It carries stylish things that are reasonably priced. Aedan and Blair went back to the hotel so that I could blog at this Internet center down the street from our hotel. It´s a very clean place of business, and it only costs 1 Euro an hour to get online, the least expensive price I´ve been charged so far on this adventure. The name of the business is Al Noor Locutorio, and it´s on Vallodolid, 9. The guy at the desk is Muslim, and he´s playing Arabic music that at times sounds like prayers. Maybe they are? The only creepy thing is that there´s a videocamera pointed at me as I write this blog, and every once in awhile it flashes, like it´s taking a picture of me. After a couple of flashes, I turned the camera to the back wall. Too Big Brothery for me.
Tomorrow, Mariana and I are going to meet with our friends at Suffolk University´s Madrid campus at 1:30 p.m. (We hosted Palo Alto´s Spain Study Abroad program there in 2003, 2004 and 2005. It will be great to see everyone.) After today, we only have five days left in Spain, and we have LOTS of ground to cover. Stay with us!
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Sevilla, Spain
When I walked into the Seville Internet Center, the Rolling Stones´ ¨Satisfaction¨ was playing. I knew my brother-in-law, Tobin, would have felt right at home. The guy who let me into the ¨gated¨ second-story site across from the Cathedral is from Michigan, and he´s lived in Sevilla for 31 years. I told him that I didn´t blame him. ¨But when it gets this hot...¨ he said, shaking his head. ¨I´m from Michigan.¨ I told him that I was from Texas, and that this temperature was normal, which sounds so much better in Spanish than in English. (Same word, different pronunciation.)
We were in Torremolinos yesterday until 12:30 p.m., which gave me plenty of time to walk down the coast to take a photo of a really cool pinwheel sculpture that I saw when we rode into the city. (Blair and Aedan decided to stay close to the hotel.) I think Corpus Christi, which is supposedly the windiest city in the U.S., should have pinwheel sculpture, too. I´ll post pictures later. I took some from every angle.)
Carly Simon is playing now. The gentleman may have left Michigan, but he didn´t leave his music behind. (I´m glad, because I really like Carly Simon. James Taylor, too. I´m still sad they broke up. I´m dating myself!)
On the way back from the pinwheel sculpture, I dashed into Super Sol, a grocery store, to look around. Spanish grocery stores fascinate me. They carry products we don´t have in the States. (Maybe at Central Market, but not the same variety.) I saw a bottle of vino tinto for 1.5 Euros. I was reminded of the year I lived in Spain and you could buy a decent bottle of red wine for 50 pesetas...about 50 cents. I strolled through the store some more, and I came across a litre of vino tinto in a box for .62 Euros or 86 cents. SCORE! I haven´t tried it yet, but if it´s drinkable, I´ll pick up more when we get to Madrid.
From the grocery store, I walked into a Chinese dollar store named Bazar Jin Bao (Ave. Manuel Mena Palma) that had everything under the sun: clothes, tools, art, plasticware, and porno films. Quite the range. I picked up some trinkets for Aedan and spent a whopping 2 Euros.
On the ride to Sevilla, Mariana and I taught our classes. We´ve almost covered all of the material in our classroom with wheels. I´m getting used to kneeling backwards on my seat facing our students, who sit in the front of the bus. So far, car sickness (bus sickness?) has not been a problem. I have a lot of faith in our driver, Ricardo, because I´m not buckled in, and I am a seat belt fanatic. Ricardo is an extremely competent, conservative driver. No hotrodding with him, thank goodness. After our drive to Madrid tomorrow, we´ll bid Ricardo a fond farewell. Emphasis on fond. He´s been great.
¨Sugar, Sugar¨ is playing now. ¨Oh, honey, honey...¨
Our lodging in Sevilla, Hotel Zenit, in the Triana neighborhood near La Iglesia San Jacinto, is lovely. It´s on the Calle Pages del Corro, number 90. Very mudejar (European/Moorish mix). Great location. I found a cute tile magnet with Sevilla´s Triana bridge to bring back to Mr. Triana, Palo Alto´s director of Facilities Management. I think he´ll like it. So many of the names of San Antonio´s citizens are on every street sign, bridge, and building here. La sangre (the blood) of Spain runs deep in our neck of the woods.
After we dropped our stuff in our rooms and freshened up a bit, Gary took us on a walking tour of Sevilla. It was hotter than Hades. Blair said that this part of the trip was to get us acclimated to San Antonio´s weather. We walked by the Torre de Oro (Tower of Gold), a Muslim defense tower, that the Spaniards used to store riches from the New World. After the group broke up, I walked into the Tourist Information Office for a list of all of the tabernas in Sevilla. (Tabernas are where locals hang out and dance Sevillanas, a form of flamenco.) From there, Blair, Steve, Aedan and I strolled around, looking for a McDonald´s to buy an inexpensive (1 Euro/$1.40) ice cream. No luck. I said, ¨Why don´t we walk in the shade?¨ One of the buildings was casting a narrow strip of shade (sombra). Steve said, ¨Ah, shade. What a great invention!¨ I must agree.
Another invention I recommend: an Irish pub. We found one called ¨Trinity¨ that is part of El Hotel de Inglaterra (Hotel of England) that boasts an altar to James Joyce in its window. (I´m still trying to convince a book club that I belong to that we need to read ¨Ulysses,¨ but I haven´t been successful so far.) The comfy seats, ice cold AC, salty peanuts and a Guinness draft were just what the doctor ordered. (Aedan had a big bottle of water. Even though she´s got an Irish moniker, she´s a wee bit young to be drinking Guinness.)
Dinner at the hotel was served at 8 p.m. Mariana and I stayed afterwards to grade all of the blogs. We stopped at 10:30 p.m. to freshen up so that we could go to a taberna, Anselmo, that Mariana had visited two years ago. Lucky for us, it´s on the same street as our hotel. Kim met us in the lobby at 10:45 p.m., and we were off. (Blair and Aedan decided to turn in. Blair said that he was going to have a t-shirt printed for me that reads TRANSNOCHERA IN TRAINING. Mariana is a transnochera...someone who can stay up all night. I´m not. I´m a need-my-sleep-nochera. However, when in Sevilla, the birthplace of flamenco, one must rise to the occasion.
We got to the taberna at 11 p.m., but it was locked up tight. We asked at a bar up the street, Las Golondrinas, what time Anselmo opened, and the bartender said, ¨Doce¨ (Twelve). I said, ¨Hijo!¨ (Son! But the translation is more like ¨Brother!¨ in English. It´s really more of a Mexican expression than a Spanish expression, but it fit the occasion.) This transnochera training is not for the faint of heart. We asked for unos tintos to pass the time. By 11:30 p.m., a line was beginning to form. (I told Mariana about a joke I´d heard earlier in the day. A woman was in line (cola), and a gentleman tapped her on the shoulder and asked, ¨Is this the line (cola)?¨And she responded, ¨No. Mas abajo.¨ (Cola also means bottom in Spanish.)
At midnight on the dot, a woman with a cigarette dangling from her mouth, dressed in orange from head to toe, appeared. She had the keys, so it was obvious that she was la dueña, the owner. She shouted, ¨Somos los mejores! Somos los mejores!¨ (We are the best! We are the best!) Sevilla´s soccer team had just won an important match, the Copa del Rey (King´s Cup) that features the country´s top 10 teams, in Madrid. (Their teams are usually trounced by Madrid´s team and/or Barcelona´s team, so it was a big night for them.) Without warning, loud, gunfire-like sounds ricocheted off of the pavement. Mariana gasped, said ¨Oh my God!¨ and ducked behind me. Since I´d spent time in Guatemala, where they launch fireworks (bombas) for every saint´s feast day....and every day is a saint´s feast day...I didn´t blink an eye. Besides, if I can survive tear gas in Oaxaca (read June 14´s entry), I can survive gunfire in Sevilla.) Meanwhile, the woman in orange was holding forth about her team´s victory. I´d really like to know what makes Spaniards´ voices so deep and inviting. My theory is that years of smoking and late nights have given Spaniards the sexiest voices on the planet. Seriously. I´d buy a CD of Spaniards talking. Maybe if I take this Transnochera training seriously, I, too, could have a voice to die for?
I started to feel like we were at Studio 54. The lady in orange, who even had an orange heart-shaped barrette in her pulled-back, jet black hair, started pointing at people to let them in. She mentioned something about reservations. Someone asked her how you got reservations if the place was just now opening. She blew them off and pointed at some others to go in. (Turns out, the chosen ones were the musicians and dancers.) Finally, at about 12:20 p.m., the rest of us were allowed in. There was a mad dash through a narrow door to get a seat. Mariana and I scored two and saved one for Kim, who was hung up in a bottleneck, which made me think of the Pamplona bottleneck Gary talked about. I was happy there weren´t any angry bulls chasing her.
After Kim sat down, Mariana got up to get us drinks at the bar. It was a good thing. After the guitarrists started playing, the lady in orange came over to ask us what we wanted to drink. ¨Tiene que pedir una copa.¨ (You have to order a drink.) I held up my now empty wine glass, and she moved over to the German college students sitting next to me. They ignored her. She wasn´t deterred. She went back to the bar and came back with a pad of paper and a pen. The message was clear: ¨Order or get out. Thirsty customers would like your seat.¨ Even though we had ¨rented¨ our seat for a glass of wine, we were ready to leave. We´d listened to three songs, but not a single person danced. We agreed if there was no dancing on the next song, we would leave. There wasn´t, so we did. Trying to make the best of my transnochera experience, I stayed up grading blogs until after 2...and I´ve paid for it all day today. I´m just not cut out for late nights. Luckily, an infusion of coffee this afternoon saved me from hitting the pavement.
Today, we´ve been running around Sevilla without pause. (It feels good to sit down and write this blog in an air-conditioned oasis.) We got up at 7, ate breakfast at 8, and were on the road by 8:45. The sites we´ve seen include El Torre de Oro, the Alcazar (oldest European palace that was built by the Moors in the seventh century and added onto by the King of Spain, Pedro, in the fifteenth century. Supposedly, this is the place Ferdinand and Isabel received Columbus upon his return from the New World. I thought the Alcazar would pale in comparison to La Alhambra, but I must say that it held its own.), the 1929 World´s Fair area (features buildings from a plethora of countries, including the U.S.), the Plaza de España that tells the story of Spain through tile, the Jewish Quarter, the Plaza de Toros de la Real Maestranza (bullring and bullfighting school...the best in the world), El Museo de Bellas Artes where we saw a beautiful exposition of paintings that feature water (also, local artists gather with their work in a park outside of the museum, which reminded me of Paris´Montmartre artists), and the Cathedral (third largest church in the world behind St. Peter´s in Rome and St. Paul´s in London...it is a Gothic masterpiece).
In the Cathedral, Blair, Aedan, Mother, Casey and I climbed the 35 ramps to the top of La Giralda, a Moorish minaret (tower) that is the symbol of Sevilla. It was built in 1198, and you are able to take in a stunning view of the entire city from the top. (It reminded me of the views from the top of the Empire State Building in New York City and Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. It also reminded me of Richard Serra´s sculptures at the Guggenheim in Bilbao. All that turning (girando) made me dizzy, much like Serra´s sculptures made me dizzy.) When we got back down, we went to see the tomb of Christopher Columbus. What a guy! Who would I have been without him? Certainly not an Spanish-French-Irish-English-German-American citizen of San Antonio, Texas, by way of Liberty, Texas, my hometown.
Tomorrow, we leave for Madrid via Cordoba and Puerto Lapice. I have a feeling that I´ll be returning to Sevilla. I hope it doesn´t take me another 25 years to make it back.
We were in Torremolinos yesterday until 12:30 p.m., which gave me plenty of time to walk down the coast to take a photo of a really cool pinwheel sculpture that I saw when we rode into the city. (Blair and Aedan decided to stay close to the hotel.) I think Corpus Christi, which is supposedly the windiest city in the U.S., should have pinwheel sculpture, too. I´ll post pictures later. I took some from every angle.)
Carly Simon is playing now. The gentleman may have left Michigan, but he didn´t leave his music behind. (I´m glad, because I really like Carly Simon. James Taylor, too. I´m still sad they broke up. I´m dating myself!)
On the way back from the pinwheel sculpture, I dashed into Super Sol, a grocery store, to look around. Spanish grocery stores fascinate me. They carry products we don´t have in the States. (Maybe at Central Market, but not the same variety.) I saw a bottle of vino tinto for 1.5 Euros. I was reminded of the year I lived in Spain and you could buy a decent bottle of red wine for 50 pesetas...about 50 cents. I strolled through the store some more, and I came across a litre of vino tinto in a box for .62 Euros or 86 cents. SCORE! I haven´t tried it yet, but if it´s drinkable, I´ll pick up more when we get to Madrid.
From the grocery store, I walked into a Chinese dollar store named Bazar Jin Bao (Ave. Manuel Mena Palma) that had everything under the sun: clothes, tools, art, plasticware, and porno films. Quite the range. I picked up some trinkets for Aedan and spent a whopping 2 Euros.
On the ride to Sevilla, Mariana and I taught our classes. We´ve almost covered all of the material in our classroom with wheels. I´m getting used to kneeling backwards on my seat facing our students, who sit in the front of the bus. So far, car sickness (bus sickness?) has not been a problem. I have a lot of faith in our driver, Ricardo, because I´m not buckled in, and I am a seat belt fanatic. Ricardo is an extremely competent, conservative driver. No hotrodding with him, thank goodness. After our drive to Madrid tomorrow, we´ll bid Ricardo a fond farewell. Emphasis on fond. He´s been great.
¨Sugar, Sugar¨ is playing now. ¨Oh, honey, honey...¨
Our lodging in Sevilla, Hotel Zenit, in the Triana neighborhood near La Iglesia San Jacinto, is lovely. It´s on the Calle Pages del Corro, number 90. Very mudejar (European/Moorish mix). Great location. I found a cute tile magnet with Sevilla´s Triana bridge to bring back to Mr. Triana, Palo Alto´s director of Facilities Management. I think he´ll like it. So many of the names of San Antonio´s citizens are on every street sign, bridge, and building here. La sangre (the blood) of Spain runs deep in our neck of the woods.
After we dropped our stuff in our rooms and freshened up a bit, Gary took us on a walking tour of Sevilla. It was hotter than Hades. Blair said that this part of the trip was to get us acclimated to San Antonio´s weather. We walked by the Torre de Oro (Tower of Gold), a Muslim defense tower, that the Spaniards used to store riches from the New World. After the group broke up, I walked into the Tourist Information Office for a list of all of the tabernas in Sevilla. (Tabernas are where locals hang out and dance Sevillanas, a form of flamenco.) From there, Blair, Steve, Aedan and I strolled around, looking for a McDonald´s to buy an inexpensive (1 Euro/$1.40) ice cream. No luck. I said, ¨Why don´t we walk in the shade?¨ One of the buildings was casting a narrow strip of shade (sombra). Steve said, ¨Ah, shade. What a great invention!¨ I must agree.
Another invention I recommend: an Irish pub. We found one called ¨Trinity¨ that is part of El Hotel de Inglaterra (Hotel of England) that boasts an altar to James Joyce in its window. (I´m still trying to convince a book club that I belong to that we need to read ¨Ulysses,¨ but I haven´t been successful so far.) The comfy seats, ice cold AC, salty peanuts and a Guinness draft were just what the doctor ordered. (Aedan had a big bottle of water. Even though she´s got an Irish moniker, she´s a wee bit young to be drinking Guinness.)
Dinner at the hotel was served at 8 p.m. Mariana and I stayed afterwards to grade all of the blogs. We stopped at 10:30 p.m. to freshen up so that we could go to a taberna, Anselmo, that Mariana had visited two years ago. Lucky for us, it´s on the same street as our hotel. Kim met us in the lobby at 10:45 p.m., and we were off. (Blair and Aedan decided to turn in. Blair said that he was going to have a t-shirt printed for me that reads TRANSNOCHERA IN TRAINING. Mariana is a transnochera...someone who can stay up all night. I´m not. I´m a need-my-sleep-nochera. However, when in Sevilla, the birthplace of flamenco, one must rise to the occasion.
We got to the taberna at 11 p.m., but it was locked up tight. We asked at a bar up the street, Las Golondrinas, what time Anselmo opened, and the bartender said, ¨Doce¨ (Twelve). I said, ¨Hijo!¨ (Son! But the translation is more like ¨Brother!¨ in English. It´s really more of a Mexican expression than a Spanish expression, but it fit the occasion.) This transnochera training is not for the faint of heart. We asked for unos tintos to pass the time. By 11:30 p.m., a line was beginning to form. (I told Mariana about a joke I´d heard earlier in the day. A woman was in line (cola), and a gentleman tapped her on the shoulder and asked, ¨Is this the line (cola)?¨And she responded, ¨No. Mas abajo.¨ (Cola also means bottom in Spanish.)
At midnight on the dot, a woman with a cigarette dangling from her mouth, dressed in orange from head to toe, appeared. She had the keys, so it was obvious that she was la dueña, the owner. She shouted, ¨Somos los mejores! Somos los mejores!¨ (We are the best! We are the best!) Sevilla´s soccer team had just won an important match, the Copa del Rey (King´s Cup) that features the country´s top 10 teams, in Madrid. (Their teams are usually trounced by Madrid´s team and/or Barcelona´s team, so it was a big night for them.) Without warning, loud, gunfire-like sounds ricocheted off of the pavement. Mariana gasped, said ¨Oh my God!¨ and ducked behind me. Since I´d spent time in Guatemala, where they launch fireworks (bombas) for every saint´s feast day....and every day is a saint´s feast day...I didn´t blink an eye. Besides, if I can survive tear gas in Oaxaca (read June 14´s entry), I can survive gunfire in Sevilla.) Meanwhile, the woman in orange was holding forth about her team´s victory. I´d really like to know what makes Spaniards´ voices so deep and inviting. My theory is that years of smoking and late nights have given Spaniards the sexiest voices on the planet. Seriously. I´d buy a CD of Spaniards talking. Maybe if I take this Transnochera training seriously, I, too, could have a voice to die for?
I started to feel like we were at Studio 54. The lady in orange, who even had an orange heart-shaped barrette in her pulled-back, jet black hair, started pointing at people to let them in. She mentioned something about reservations. Someone asked her how you got reservations if the place was just now opening. She blew them off and pointed at some others to go in. (Turns out, the chosen ones were the musicians and dancers.) Finally, at about 12:20 p.m., the rest of us were allowed in. There was a mad dash through a narrow door to get a seat. Mariana and I scored two and saved one for Kim, who was hung up in a bottleneck, which made me think of the Pamplona bottleneck Gary talked about. I was happy there weren´t any angry bulls chasing her.
After Kim sat down, Mariana got up to get us drinks at the bar. It was a good thing. After the guitarrists started playing, the lady in orange came over to ask us what we wanted to drink. ¨Tiene que pedir una copa.¨ (You have to order a drink.) I held up my now empty wine glass, and she moved over to the German college students sitting next to me. They ignored her. She wasn´t deterred. She went back to the bar and came back with a pad of paper and a pen. The message was clear: ¨Order or get out. Thirsty customers would like your seat.¨ Even though we had ¨rented¨ our seat for a glass of wine, we were ready to leave. We´d listened to three songs, but not a single person danced. We agreed if there was no dancing on the next song, we would leave. There wasn´t, so we did. Trying to make the best of my transnochera experience, I stayed up grading blogs until after 2...and I´ve paid for it all day today. I´m just not cut out for late nights. Luckily, an infusion of coffee this afternoon saved me from hitting the pavement.
Today, we´ve been running around Sevilla without pause. (It feels good to sit down and write this blog in an air-conditioned oasis.) We got up at 7, ate breakfast at 8, and were on the road by 8:45. The sites we´ve seen include El Torre de Oro, the Alcazar (oldest European palace that was built by the Moors in the seventh century and added onto by the King of Spain, Pedro, in the fifteenth century. Supposedly, this is the place Ferdinand and Isabel received Columbus upon his return from the New World. I thought the Alcazar would pale in comparison to La Alhambra, but I must say that it held its own.), the 1929 World´s Fair area (features buildings from a plethora of countries, including the U.S.), the Plaza de España that tells the story of Spain through tile, the Jewish Quarter, the Plaza de Toros de la Real Maestranza (bullring and bullfighting school...the best in the world), El Museo de Bellas Artes where we saw a beautiful exposition of paintings that feature water (also, local artists gather with their work in a park outside of the museum, which reminded me of Paris´Montmartre artists), and the Cathedral (third largest church in the world behind St. Peter´s in Rome and St. Paul´s in London...it is a Gothic masterpiece).
In the Cathedral, Blair, Aedan, Mother, Casey and I climbed the 35 ramps to the top of La Giralda, a Moorish minaret (tower) that is the symbol of Sevilla. It was built in 1198, and you are able to take in a stunning view of the entire city from the top. (It reminded me of the views from the top of the Empire State Building in New York City and Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. It also reminded me of Richard Serra´s sculptures at the Guggenheim in Bilbao. All that turning (girando) made me dizzy, much like Serra´s sculptures made me dizzy.) When we got back down, we went to see the tomb of Christopher Columbus. What a guy! Who would I have been without him? Certainly not an Spanish-French-Irish-English-German-American citizen of San Antonio, Texas, by way of Liberty, Texas, my hometown.
Tomorrow, we leave for Madrid via Cordoba and Puerto Lapice. I have a feeling that I´ll be returning to Sevilla. I hope it doesn´t take me another 25 years to make it back.
Friday, June 22, 2007
Torremolinos, Spain
We arrived in Torremolinos, a lovely beach town on the Mediterranean, yesterday afternoon after a glorious morning/lunch hour in Granada.
La Alhambra, a United Nations´World Heritage site, was over the top. Amazingly beautiful. (As I wrote earlier, this was my third visit, but I hadn´t been since 1986. The site has definitely been lovingly restored over the past 21 years.) My mother said, ¨When you spend a half a day seeing something like this, you realize how much of your life has been wasted.¨ I have to agree. Every inch of the place was designed to please the eyes (walls covered with intricate plaster carvings in Arabic, inlaid wood ceilings, and to-die-for tiles in a multitude of geometric patterns), the ears (channels of water run throughout the complex, which provide soft, soothing background noise that isn´t noise at all...more like music), and the nose (fragrant flowers--abundant roses and jasmine--and herbs--we especially liked the lemon thyme). An inscription in La Alhambra reads: "Give alms to this blind man, Madam, because there is no bigger sorrow than being blind in Granada.¨ The Alhambra is definitely a feast for the eyes, and we said how happy we were that Los Reyes Catolicos, Ferdinand and Isabel, didn´t raze the place when they conquered Granada in 1492. Even they must have been awed by its beauty.
Our tour guide, Nils, is a Spaniard whose father is Swedish and mother is French. He grew up in a small town in the south of Spain, and his love of La Alhambra is reverential. He started the tour by taking us to the Generalife gardens, where the soothing sound of water can be heard throughout the area. Nils explained that the Moors believed that water was very spiritual and was present to remind the palace´s tenants of their spiritual nature. (Steve said he thought that they had a high regard for water, since it was such a limited resource.) According to Nils, the gardens gave them a place to think, to be, and to hear God. On the tour, I was also reminded of the Japanese art of Feng Shui, where water is an essential element to incorporate into your living environment.
As we walked through La Alhambra, I couldn´t help but think of quilts. Each and every tile design would make an amazing quilt design. I took a million pictures. (Okay, maybe not a million, but a ton that I´m going to share with my fellow quilters when I return home. I´ll post some here, too.) Nils also talked about how geometry wasn´t so practical back in their day. It was more of a spiritual quest, with theorists trying to make sense of their world.
The views from the castle, which is what La Alhambra was, were stunning. As Nils said, it was a view fit for a king (or sultan). It was nice to be royal for a day. We climbed back onto the bus to make our way to downtown Granada. Mother, Casey and Aedan found a place to hang while Blair and I walked over to see the tomb of Ferdinand and Isabel. Unfortunately, we got to La Capilla (the chapel) during siesta. All was not lost, though. The acoustics near the Cathedral were very good, and street musicians were out. We heard a trio of guitarrists who gave me chills. I´ll post a clip of them playing on youtube when I return home.
We also found a guy who would write your name in Arabic for 1 Euro. I had my name, Aedan´s name, and my Aunt Joe Ann´s name done. (Joe Ann is a calligraphy expert, so I knew she´d love this recuerdo.) Blair asked me how I knew the artist wasn´t writing ¨You are full of it¨ or something worse. I said that I didn´t know, but the calligraphy was beautiful regardless. When we stopped at a little shop not far away to buy some other goodies, the shopkeeper said ¨Denise¨. I looked up shocked and asked him how he knew my name. He pointed at the writing. I showed him the other two, and he sounded out Aedan and Joe Ann. So, I guess the writing is the real deal. I´m glad, because I´d hate to give my Aunt Joe Ann a present that says ¨Curse you, American heathen.¨
We met Mother, Casey and Aedan and walked down to La Plaza Nueva for lunch at Doner Kebap Nemrut. For 6 Euros each, we got a lunch special that included a chicken (or beef) gyro, french fries, a chilled mug of Mahou beer, and a piece of baklava. YUM! Tasty food, a lovely outdoor setting and interesting conversation made it a memorable lunch. We got back to the bus at 3:10, and everyone except Steve and a couple of the girls from Alaska were on board. I wasn´t worried about the girls, because one of their adult leaders knew they were on their way, but I was worried about Steve. He´s usually very prompt. We´d seen an altercation (loud arguing, finger pointing and almost shoving) among some gypsy women while we were near the Cathedral, and I wondered if he hadn´t been spirited away by gypsies. (Casey said that the gypsies don´t watch soap operas here, so they create their own.) Instead, Steve had lunch in a local bar, and he said, ¨You know how it is when you´re in a bar and someone wants to tell you their life story and you´re too polite to tell them you´ve got to go and that you don´t speak Spanish very well? Well, that´s what happened. Lo siento. (I´m sorry.)¨ For the record, I think Steve speaks Spanish quite well for someone who only had it in high school. I can´t believe he remembers as much as he does, but then again he´s a very smart guy.
From Granada, we drove two hours west to Torremolinos, which is on Spain´s beautiful Costa del Sol. (Sean Connery, the real James Bond, has a house up the road in Marbella.) Our hotel has a pool, so, of course, Aedan wanted to jump in. It wasn´t as cold as the hotel pool in Granada, but it was pretty darn cold. I yelped when I hit the water, and a gentleman who was sitting on the side of the pool laughed. He said that he was from Madrid, and the water was even cold for him. We started talking, and I found out that he was holding his 9-month-old son, Francisco, while watching his 8-year-old daughter, Laura, swim. I told him that I´d lived in Madrid for a year and that I was still crazy about it. He seemed pleased.
We got ready for dinner and made our way down to the hotel´s buffet. Quite a spread. I ate my fill without an ounce of guilt. One of my students said, ¨I didn´t know we were going to lose weight on this trip!¨ I said, ¨Didn´t you know it was a Spa Study Abroad?!¨ We have been walking our legs off...literally. It sort of reminds me of ¨The Secret Garden¨. Remember the sickly boy who goes out to play with the other children, and little by little, he becomes healthy? That´s what´s happening with us. My calves are rock hard. My thighs and glutes are slimming down from the constant up and down stair climbing. One of the travelers injured her leg back home, and she said this trip has been the best physical therapy she´s ever had. I told her that she ought to ask her doctor to prescribe an annual trip to Spain instead of regular PT. (It would probably cost less.)
After dinner, which we had with Gary, Mother and Casey, we walked down the hill, about a 10-minute straight shot, to the sea. Some other Palo Altoites were already there picking up pebbles and shells. We laughed and said that when the airline asks us if we have rocks in our suitcase, we´ll be able to say yes truthfully. We walked back to the hotel, uphill, where we ran into Kim and Mariana, who were plotting a trip to Ronda, a two-hour bus ride north of Torremolinos, for the next day. We enjoyed a bebida and watched a young (3ish) Spanish girl dressed in ropa flamenca tipica (polka dots galore) hold forth on a mini stage. Precious.
Today, we spent the whole day hanging out at the beach. We met a lovely British couple, Susie and Tony, who have lived in Torremolinos for more than 20 years. I had a cup of coffee on the beach, and I said how happy I was to be drinking Spanish coffee again. Tony said, ¨It´s the best in the world. It´s one of the reasons I live here.¨ He said that he had at least four cups a day. Aedan said, ¨And I thought she (meaning me) was bad!¨ I don´t blame Tony at all. Truly, Starbucks wishes its coffee tasted so good. Tony and Susie are planning a trip to Florida soon, and I invited them to visit San Antonio. I told them they could probably get an inexpensive fare on Southwest Airlines. I hope they decide to make the hop over the Gulf of Mexico.
Mañana, we´re off to Sevilla. This trip is going by way too fast. After two nights in Sevilla, we´ll head back to Madrid. Some will stay only two nights there, but the rest of us will have seven nights. Can´t wait, but it feels like we already need to start planning our next visit over. Anyone want to join us? :)
La Alhambra, a United Nations´World Heritage site, was over the top. Amazingly beautiful. (As I wrote earlier, this was my third visit, but I hadn´t been since 1986. The site has definitely been lovingly restored over the past 21 years.) My mother said, ¨When you spend a half a day seeing something like this, you realize how much of your life has been wasted.¨ I have to agree. Every inch of the place was designed to please the eyes (walls covered with intricate plaster carvings in Arabic, inlaid wood ceilings, and to-die-for tiles in a multitude of geometric patterns), the ears (channels of water run throughout the complex, which provide soft, soothing background noise that isn´t noise at all...more like music), and the nose (fragrant flowers--abundant roses and jasmine--and herbs--we especially liked the lemon thyme). An inscription in La Alhambra reads: "Give alms to this blind man, Madam, because there is no bigger sorrow than being blind in Granada.¨ The Alhambra is definitely a feast for the eyes, and we said how happy we were that Los Reyes Catolicos, Ferdinand and Isabel, didn´t raze the place when they conquered Granada in 1492. Even they must have been awed by its beauty.
Our tour guide, Nils, is a Spaniard whose father is Swedish and mother is French. He grew up in a small town in the south of Spain, and his love of La Alhambra is reverential. He started the tour by taking us to the Generalife gardens, where the soothing sound of water can be heard throughout the area. Nils explained that the Moors believed that water was very spiritual and was present to remind the palace´s tenants of their spiritual nature. (Steve said he thought that they had a high regard for water, since it was such a limited resource.) According to Nils, the gardens gave them a place to think, to be, and to hear God. On the tour, I was also reminded of the Japanese art of Feng Shui, where water is an essential element to incorporate into your living environment.
As we walked through La Alhambra, I couldn´t help but think of quilts. Each and every tile design would make an amazing quilt design. I took a million pictures. (Okay, maybe not a million, but a ton that I´m going to share with my fellow quilters when I return home. I´ll post some here, too.) Nils also talked about how geometry wasn´t so practical back in their day. It was more of a spiritual quest, with theorists trying to make sense of their world.
The views from the castle, which is what La Alhambra was, were stunning. As Nils said, it was a view fit for a king (or sultan). It was nice to be royal for a day. We climbed back onto the bus to make our way to downtown Granada. Mother, Casey and Aedan found a place to hang while Blair and I walked over to see the tomb of Ferdinand and Isabel. Unfortunately, we got to La Capilla (the chapel) during siesta. All was not lost, though. The acoustics near the Cathedral were very good, and street musicians were out. We heard a trio of guitarrists who gave me chills. I´ll post a clip of them playing on youtube when I return home.
We also found a guy who would write your name in Arabic for 1 Euro. I had my name, Aedan´s name, and my Aunt Joe Ann´s name done. (Joe Ann is a calligraphy expert, so I knew she´d love this recuerdo.) Blair asked me how I knew the artist wasn´t writing ¨You are full of it¨ or something worse. I said that I didn´t know, but the calligraphy was beautiful regardless. When we stopped at a little shop not far away to buy some other goodies, the shopkeeper said ¨Denise¨. I looked up shocked and asked him how he knew my name. He pointed at the writing. I showed him the other two, and he sounded out Aedan and Joe Ann. So, I guess the writing is the real deal. I´m glad, because I´d hate to give my Aunt Joe Ann a present that says ¨Curse you, American heathen.¨
We met Mother, Casey and Aedan and walked down to La Plaza Nueva for lunch at Doner Kebap Nemrut. For 6 Euros each, we got a lunch special that included a chicken (or beef) gyro, french fries, a chilled mug of Mahou beer, and a piece of baklava. YUM! Tasty food, a lovely outdoor setting and interesting conversation made it a memorable lunch. We got back to the bus at 3:10, and everyone except Steve and a couple of the girls from Alaska were on board. I wasn´t worried about the girls, because one of their adult leaders knew they were on their way, but I was worried about Steve. He´s usually very prompt. We´d seen an altercation (loud arguing, finger pointing and almost shoving) among some gypsy women while we were near the Cathedral, and I wondered if he hadn´t been spirited away by gypsies. (Casey said that the gypsies don´t watch soap operas here, so they create their own.) Instead, Steve had lunch in a local bar, and he said, ¨You know how it is when you´re in a bar and someone wants to tell you their life story and you´re too polite to tell them you´ve got to go and that you don´t speak Spanish very well? Well, that´s what happened. Lo siento. (I´m sorry.)¨ For the record, I think Steve speaks Spanish quite well for someone who only had it in high school. I can´t believe he remembers as much as he does, but then again he´s a very smart guy.
From Granada, we drove two hours west to Torremolinos, which is on Spain´s beautiful Costa del Sol. (Sean Connery, the real James Bond, has a house up the road in Marbella.) Our hotel has a pool, so, of course, Aedan wanted to jump in. It wasn´t as cold as the hotel pool in Granada, but it was pretty darn cold. I yelped when I hit the water, and a gentleman who was sitting on the side of the pool laughed. He said that he was from Madrid, and the water was even cold for him. We started talking, and I found out that he was holding his 9-month-old son, Francisco, while watching his 8-year-old daughter, Laura, swim. I told him that I´d lived in Madrid for a year and that I was still crazy about it. He seemed pleased.
We got ready for dinner and made our way down to the hotel´s buffet. Quite a spread. I ate my fill without an ounce of guilt. One of my students said, ¨I didn´t know we were going to lose weight on this trip!¨ I said, ¨Didn´t you know it was a Spa Study Abroad?!¨ We have been walking our legs off...literally. It sort of reminds me of ¨The Secret Garden¨. Remember the sickly boy who goes out to play with the other children, and little by little, he becomes healthy? That´s what´s happening with us. My calves are rock hard. My thighs and glutes are slimming down from the constant up and down stair climbing. One of the travelers injured her leg back home, and she said this trip has been the best physical therapy she´s ever had. I told her that she ought to ask her doctor to prescribe an annual trip to Spain instead of regular PT. (It would probably cost less.)
After dinner, which we had with Gary, Mother and Casey, we walked down the hill, about a 10-minute straight shot, to the sea. Some other Palo Altoites were already there picking up pebbles and shells. We laughed and said that when the airline asks us if we have rocks in our suitcase, we´ll be able to say yes truthfully. We walked back to the hotel, uphill, where we ran into Kim and Mariana, who were plotting a trip to Ronda, a two-hour bus ride north of Torremolinos, for the next day. We enjoyed a bebida and watched a young (3ish) Spanish girl dressed in ropa flamenca tipica (polka dots galore) hold forth on a mini stage. Precious.
Today, we spent the whole day hanging out at the beach. We met a lovely British couple, Susie and Tony, who have lived in Torremolinos for more than 20 years. I had a cup of coffee on the beach, and I said how happy I was to be drinking Spanish coffee again. Tony said, ¨It´s the best in the world. It´s one of the reasons I live here.¨ He said that he had at least four cups a day. Aedan said, ¨And I thought she (meaning me) was bad!¨ I don´t blame Tony at all. Truly, Starbucks wishes its coffee tasted so good. Tony and Susie are planning a trip to Florida soon, and I invited them to visit San Antonio. I told them they could probably get an inexpensive fare on Southwest Airlines. I hope they decide to make the hop over the Gulf of Mexico.
Mañana, we´re off to Sevilla. This trip is going by way too fast. After two nights in Sevilla, we´ll head back to Madrid. Some will stay only two nights there, but the rest of us will have seven nights. Can´t wait, but it feels like we already need to start planning our next visit over. Anyone want to join us? :)
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Granada, Spain
The ¨Search for the Holy Grail¨ theme continued as we traveled from Valencia to Granada. We kept seeing signs for Murcia, and we couldn´t help but think of coconuts. ¨Murcia? But Murcia is a temperate zone. The coconut is tropical.¨
The 7-hour bus ride was filled with vistas of orange groves, olive groves, pomegranates, some corn, ancient castles, the Mediterranean Ocean, rocky cliffs, mountainside caves that serve as homes, and even snow-capped peaks as we got closer to Granada. Gary explained that Benidorm, a highly developed (like Cancun) city on the coast, is where all of the Madrileños hang out in June, July and August. He said that some of the clubs in Madrid even rent space in Benidorm to serve their regular clients.
The south of Spain doesn´t get much rain, and the colors are muted--rust, taupe, and dark green--and the ground is caliche-like. It definitely feels much different than the north of Spain, which gets lots of rain and is very green. It´s a different kind of beauty, sort of like the Southwestern U.S.
While we were on the road, Mariana and I reviewed our assigned chapters with the students. Everyone seems to be getting into the story (telenovela) that Spain is. I also enjoyed hearing what scenes they´d witnessed in Valencia and how they´d written or would write about them. Lee Gutkind, the author of the book I assigned, says that all good stories begin with a conflict, where you show a person or subject in action. We talked about the best way to start a story about Ish´s experience of having his wallet pickpocketed in Valencia. He´s the second person on our tour to lose valuables. Caroline´s purse was stolen in Madrid. Luckily, both of them were wearing their important documents (passport, etc.) under their clothes.
Gary bought ¨Open Season¨ for us to watch on the bus after our lunch stop. Aedan was very happy to have an age-appropriate film to enjoy, and she was also very happy to discover a pool at our hotel. We decided to give it a try. Some of our Alaskan busmates had already made it down, and they said the water was fine. Texans should never ask Alaskans for pool temperature advice. We jumped in and were immediately covered in goosebumps. Think Barton Springs in Austin times two. Invigorating, to say the least. I´m proud of two of my students, Erica and Sarah, who also joined the Polar Bear Club.
Tomorrow, we are going to take a guided tour of La Alhambra, another architectural marvel. This will be my third visit, but I´m still looking forward to its magic. Granada was the Moorish capital from 711 to 1492, and it still feels more Arabic than Spanish or European. After our tour of La Alhambra and the surrounding gardens, we will have time to walk through the Albaicin, an ancient Moorish market that hasn´t changed much, if any, over the years. Since we´re not taking the optional trip to Morocco, it´s the closest we´ll get. (It´ll be like going to Market Square in San Antonio instead of making the trek to Laredo.)
When we were in Valencia´s Cathedral yesterday, the audio tour spoke of some saint whose name I didn´t catch, but he was St. So and So, the Magnanimous. It made me think of a guy who works at the Domino´s Pizza near our home in San Antonio. His nametag reads Antoine, the Legendary. It cracks me up every time I see it. It also makes me think what adjective I´d like to use to describe me. Since magnanimous and legendary are already taken, I´ll have to come up with something else.
The 7-hour bus ride was filled with vistas of orange groves, olive groves, pomegranates, some corn, ancient castles, the Mediterranean Ocean, rocky cliffs, mountainside caves that serve as homes, and even snow-capped peaks as we got closer to Granada. Gary explained that Benidorm, a highly developed (like Cancun) city on the coast, is where all of the Madrileños hang out in June, July and August. He said that some of the clubs in Madrid even rent space in Benidorm to serve their regular clients.
The south of Spain doesn´t get much rain, and the colors are muted--rust, taupe, and dark green--and the ground is caliche-like. It definitely feels much different than the north of Spain, which gets lots of rain and is very green. It´s a different kind of beauty, sort of like the Southwestern U.S.
While we were on the road, Mariana and I reviewed our assigned chapters with the students. Everyone seems to be getting into the story (telenovela) that Spain is. I also enjoyed hearing what scenes they´d witnessed in Valencia and how they´d written or would write about them. Lee Gutkind, the author of the book I assigned, says that all good stories begin with a conflict, where you show a person or subject in action. We talked about the best way to start a story about Ish´s experience of having his wallet pickpocketed in Valencia. He´s the second person on our tour to lose valuables. Caroline´s purse was stolen in Madrid. Luckily, both of them were wearing their important documents (passport, etc.) under their clothes.
Gary bought ¨Open Season¨ for us to watch on the bus after our lunch stop. Aedan was very happy to have an age-appropriate film to enjoy, and she was also very happy to discover a pool at our hotel. We decided to give it a try. Some of our Alaskan busmates had already made it down, and they said the water was fine. Texans should never ask Alaskans for pool temperature advice. We jumped in and were immediately covered in goosebumps. Think Barton Springs in Austin times two. Invigorating, to say the least. I´m proud of two of my students, Erica and Sarah, who also joined the Polar Bear Club.
Tomorrow, we are going to take a guided tour of La Alhambra, another architectural marvel. This will be my third visit, but I´m still looking forward to its magic. Granada was the Moorish capital from 711 to 1492, and it still feels more Arabic than Spanish or European. After our tour of La Alhambra and the surrounding gardens, we will have time to walk through the Albaicin, an ancient Moorish market that hasn´t changed much, if any, over the years. Since we´re not taking the optional trip to Morocco, it´s the closest we´ll get. (It´ll be like going to Market Square in San Antonio instead of making the trek to Laredo.)
When we were in Valencia´s Cathedral yesterday, the audio tour spoke of some saint whose name I didn´t catch, but he was St. So and So, the Magnanimous. It made me think of a guy who works at the Domino´s Pizza near our home in San Antonio. His nametag reads Antoine, the Legendary. It cracks me up every time I see it. It also makes me think what adjective I´d like to use to describe me. Since magnanimous and legendary are already taken, I´ll have to come up with something else.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Valencia, Spain
I haven´t been to Valencia since 1982, and I have to say it´s changed for the better. After spending the fall semester in cosmopolitan Madrid, I thought Valencia needed quite a bit of sprucing up when I saw it the following spring. It´s spruced.
The architect Santiago Calatrava, a Valencia native, designed a City of Arts and Sciences (1991-2004) that´s amazing to see and walk through. It houses a world-class aquarium and opera house. Located on the edge of the Mar Mediterraneo, it looks like a giant fish about to jump back into the water. Casey, my mother´s novio said, ¨It´s a female fish.¨ I took the bait and asked him how he knew. He said, ¨Her mouth is open.¨
We then stopped in front of the city´s bullring before heading out to tour the town. Our first destination was the Cathedral, home of the Holy Grail, the chalice that Jesus Christ used at the Last Supper. Scenes from Monty Python´s ¨Search for the Holy Grail¨ flashed through my mind as we neared the Cathedral. (¨She turned me into a newt! Well, I got better.¨ and ¨Why else do you think I have this ridiculous accent?¨) However, the Cathedral´s quiet beauty removed any strains of silliness. For 3 Euros, you are able to enter and enjoy a well done audio tour. I was impressed by the main altar. The ceiling frescoes of stunning angels painted on a royal blue background had recently been restored. Behind the altar, you´ll find St. Vincent the Martyr´s arm. His whole arm. I´ve seen relics before, but I don´t think I´ve ever seen a relic that big. St. Vincent is the patron saint of Valencia.
We then walked to the special chapel that houses the Holy Grail. It gave me chills to think that Christ could have held that cup. The chapel itself is fairly plain, unlike the many side chapels that are very ornate. (One of the chapels even showcased two of Goya´s paintings.) The chalice, or grail, is also very austere. No diamonds and rubies here. Simple, but beautiful.
After touring the Cathedral, we decided to walk over to the market to buy a piece of fruit. By the time we got there, it was closed for the lunch hour and wouldn´t open again until 6 p.m. It was nice to see the building, though, which is covered in blue and yellow tile.
Now Mariana and I are sitting in a nice ¨Centro de Internet¨called Ono on the corner of Maria Cristina and San Vicente Martir. We´re paying 3 Euros an hour to use their computers, but it´s worth every centimo. We only paid 1.20 Euros per hour in Barcelona, but it was pure hell. The person to the side of me, whose elbows I became well acquainted, with smoked non-stop. Four teenage boys who were playing the online game World of Warcraft cussed and smoked non-stop for an hour and a half. (I knew they were playing WOW, because one of my reporters--Miguel Serna--from last semester wrote about it. He´s an avid player.) One of the kids held forth with a running commentary the entire session and two out of his three words should not have been uttered in public. I finally had enough. I was trying to concentrate and type as fast as I could. I said, ¨Oye. Por favor. Bajalo!¨(Listen. Please. Turn it down.¨) He said, ¨Si. Bueno.¨ (Yes. Fine.) I was feeling pretty pleased with myself, but 15 seconds later, he was back at it, even louder if possible. (Perhaps I should have asked him to talk louder and curse more? Reverse psychology. I haven´t entered the teenage parenting years yet, so I wasn´t prepared.) Meanwhile, a French girl, also a smoker, sat down next to me. She proceeded to let out the biggest burp I´ve ever heard. (Reminded me of Amy Stubblefield´s childhood dog, Ming, who was quite a burper. The Stubblefield family would always reply, ¨Ming, did you get any on you?¨) I felt like asking the French girl if she got any on her, but I didn´t think she´d get it. Instead, I just looked at her, and she said with a very cute, not ridiculous, French accent, ¨I´m so embarrassed.¨ We both laughed. I told her it was okay, and I also told her I couldn´t believe the kid in the room could talk non-stop for an hour and a half. Mercifully, our time ran out. As we descended the narrow staircase, the kid was still talking.
We´ve got to leave to meet up with our group. I hope paella is on tonight´s menu. Valencia is famous for it. Alba, we´re thinking of you! Mañana, Granada. Stay tuned!
The architect Santiago Calatrava, a Valencia native, designed a City of Arts and Sciences (1991-2004) that´s amazing to see and walk through. It houses a world-class aquarium and opera house. Located on the edge of the Mar Mediterraneo, it looks like a giant fish about to jump back into the water. Casey, my mother´s novio said, ¨It´s a female fish.¨ I took the bait and asked him how he knew. He said, ¨Her mouth is open.¨
We then stopped in front of the city´s bullring before heading out to tour the town. Our first destination was the Cathedral, home of the Holy Grail, the chalice that Jesus Christ used at the Last Supper. Scenes from Monty Python´s ¨Search for the Holy Grail¨ flashed through my mind as we neared the Cathedral. (¨She turned me into a newt! Well, I got better.¨ and ¨Why else do you think I have this ridiculous accent?¨) However, the Cathedral´s quiet beauty removed any strains of silliness. For 3 Euros, you are able to enter and enjoy a well done audio tour. I was impressed by the main altar. The ceiling frescoes of stunning angels painted on a royal blue background had recently been restored. Behind the altar, you´ll find St. Vincent the Martyr´s arm. His whole arm. I´ve seen relics before, but I don´t think I´ve ever seen a relic that big. St. Vincent is the patron saint of Valencia.
We then walked to the special chapel that houses the Holy Grail. It gave me chills to think that Christ could have held that cup. The chapel itself is fairly plain, unlike the many side chapels that are very ornate. (One of the chapels even showcased two of Goya´s paintings.) The chalice, or grail, is also very austere. No diamonds and rubies here. Simple, but beautiful.
After touring the Cathedral, we decided to walk over to the market to buy a piece of fruit. By the time we got there, it was closed for the lunch hour and wouldn´t open again until 6 p.m. It was nice to see the building, though, which is covered in blue and yellow tile.
Now Mariana and I are sitting in a nice ¨Centro de Internet¨called Ono on the corner of Maria Cristina and San Vicente Martir. We´re paying 3 Euros an hour to use their computers, but it´s worth every centimo. We only paid 1.20 Euros per hour in Barcelona, but it was pure hell. The person to the side of me, whose elbows I became well acquainted, with smoked non-stop. Four teenage boys who were playing the online game World of Warcraft cussed and smoked non-stop for an hour and a half. (I knew they were playing WOW, because one of my reporters--Miguel Serna--from last semester wrote about it. He´s an avid player.) One of the kids held forth with a running commentary the entire session and two out of his three words should not have been uttered in public. I finally had enough. I was trying to concentrate and type as fast as I could. I said, ¨Oye. Por favor. Bajalo!¨(Listen. Please. Turn it down.¨) He said, ¨Si. Bueno.¨ (Yes. Fine.) I was feeling pretty pleased with myself, but 15 seconds later, he was back at it, even louder if possible. (Perhaps I should have asked him to talk louder and curse more? Reverse psychology. I haven´t entered the teenage parenting years yet, so I wasn´t prepared.) Meanwhile, a French girl, also a smoker, sat down next to me. She proceeded to let out the biggest burp I´ve ever heard. (Reminded me of Amy Stubblefield´s childhood dog, Ming, who was quite a burper. The Stubblefield family would always reply, ¨Ming, did you get any on you?¨) I felt like asking the French girl if she got any on her, but I didn´t think she´d get it. Instead, I just looked at her, and she said with a very cute, not ridiculous, French accent, ¨I´m so embarrassed.¨ We both laughed. I told her it was okay, and I also told her I couldn´t believe the kid in the room could talk non-stop for an hour and a half. Mercifully, our time ran out. As we descended the narrow staircase, the kid was still talking.
We´ve got to leave to meet up with our group. I hope paella is on tonight´s menu. Valencia is famous for it. Alba, we´re thinking of you! Mañana, Granada. Stay tuned!
Monday, June 18, 2007
Barcelona, Spain
We arrived in Barcelona last night after a brief stop in Pamplona. Blair and I walked the entire ¨running of the bulls¨ route. It was much shorter than we expected. However, I´m sure if you´ve got a herd of angry bulls chasing you, it seems much longer. (Spectators hit the bulls with rolled up newspapers to make the bulls see red. I think I´d be carrying my own newspaper to beat back the spectators.) Gary, our guide, said the entire run takes about three minutes, and it´s all uphill. I also didn´t realize it´s not just one run; it´s a week´s worth of runs, all during San Fermin´s Feast Week. A small altar to San Fermin can be seen near where the race begins. I wonder what he thinks of all the hoopla?
Gary pointed out the two most dangerous spots on the route. The first is where the runners make a 90-degree turn from one narrow street onto another narrow street. The second most dangerous point is when everyone is dashing into the bull ring at the end of the race. On the weekends, about 3,000 runners participate, and a bottleneck is created at the entrance. A giant statue of Ernest Hemingway sits just outside of the bullring taking it all in. He´s the one who put Pamplona on the map, so they honored him with a statue.
After walking the route, we went into their plaza mayor, where some sort of street festival was going on. A bicyle-powered centrifugal force amusement ride was a main feature. We watched two young (12ish) boys strapped onto bicycles pedal their way to a complete 360-degree circle. I got dizzy just watching them. Over and over and over they went. It´s what I imagined I could do as a kid swinging, if I just pumped my legs hard enough.
From Pamplona, we continued our journey to Barcelona. Everyone agreed that San Sebastian had been the high point of the trip so far. It is a gorgeous place. The scenery (think stunning ocean view) alone is worth the trip. Throw in the mouth-watering food, the energetic street action and 70 degree temperatures and you´ve got heaven on earth.
Six of us ended our visit in San Sebastian by taking in ¨Cuatro Voces,¨ a flamenco ballet by Eva Yerbabuena, a dancer/choreographer who won the national prize for best flamenco dancer in 2001. (Her footwork was beyond amazing. Sounded like machine guns at times. I didn´t know feet could move so fast with such perfect timing.) She was also featured in a recent film by a British director called ¨The Women of Flamenco¨. I´m not familiar with it, but I want to see it when we return home. The ballet was in the beautifully renovated Victoria Eugenia theatre, which boasts four levels of gilded seating and a cherub-painted ceiling. The voices of the four men who sang while Eva danced gave me goosebumps. Her dance troupe was equally outstanding, especially the male dancers. The two guitarrists, the flautist and the percussionist also played their hearts out.
We arrived at our hotel outside of Barcelona a little after 8 p.m., and we had dinner at 8:30. (We watched ¨Billy Elliott¨ in Spanish with English subtitles on the bus. We also saw most of Austin´s own Richard Linklater´s film, ¨Before Sunrise¨.) The name of our hotel is NH Sant Boi. Lovely. Very modern. Our only complaint is that the hotel is located in an industrial park, far from downtown. We left the hotel at 9 a.m. this morning for a ¨vuelta¨ (circle) around Barcelona. Our first stop was the Parque Guell, Antonio Gaudi´s fanciful park that´s covered in brightly colored mosaics. What a place! It sort of reminds me of San Antonio´s Sunken Gardens...or what the Sunken Gardens could be. We then went to Gaudi´s unfinished cathedral, La Sagrada Familia, whose spires remind me of hand-dripped sandcastles. From there, we went to the top of Monjuic, where we ran into a group of traveling alumni from the University of Texas at Austin. After trading hook ém horns signs, we saw a gorgeous view of the entire city, and then we passed by the Olympic Stadium. I took a picture of the torch for Stacey Johnson, Palo Alto´s Dean of Arts and Humanities, who was an Olympic fencer. The guide reminded us that Barcelona is where Greg Louganis won all of his medals for diving in 1992. I remember what a thrill it was to watch him on TV.
We then were dropped off at Plaza Catalunya, and several of us headed down Las Ramblas to the Boqueria Market. I took a photo of a street performer dressed up like Salvador Dali. He did Dali proud. (I´ll load photos of these different sights when we get back to San Antonio, when I´m not being charged by the minute for an Internet connection.) Blair and I got slices of jamon serrano and Gallego cheese to make a sandwich. Scrumptious. We then sat on the sidewalk, ate our lunch and watched the world pass by.
Our next destination was the Cathedral. Gary told us that street musicians hang out in the area around there. We saw an opera singer, a harpist, and a couple of classical guitarists. The acoustics did justice to the talented performers. We also were able to pat a carved turtle that´s supposed to bring good luck. We then dashed into the Aragon Museum, which had a lovely courtyard and ancient illuminated manuscripts, some dating back to the 1300s...way before Columbus ever made his way to the Americas. Just goes to show you the importance of leaving a record behind.
We then walked up Avenida Porta de l´Angel, toward Plaza de Catalunya. More fantastic street musicians. This group was a clarinetist and a percussionist, who played something I´d never seen before. Sounded like a steel drum, but it was the shape of a walnut. Not exactly round, but rounded. Way cool. A woman was sitting next to the group. She was completely bald and wore sandals with bright orange socks. Quite the fashion statement. I don´t know that I´d be brave enough to pull that look off, but it worked for her.
Nature called, so we dashed into McDonald´s. We paid back their hospitality by purchasing .60 Euro vanilla ice cream cones that we ate on benches outside. While there, we ran into some friends from San Antonio. Small world! Nicolas teaches math and physics at UTSA, but his specialty is architectural theory. He´s in Barcelona to give a talk. His daughter, Sofia, is in Aedan´s dance class. His youngest daughter, Alexia, was with him. After we caught our breath, we headed down Passeig de Gracia to see more of Gaudi´s architecture. His famous Casa Batllo, a home he designed for a wealthy family, is on a block called ¨La Manzana de la Discordia¨ (Block of Discord) because of three different architectural styles that clash. In my humble opinion, Gaudi won the fight hands down. One of our fellow travelers, Kim, paid the 16 Euros to see the inside. I´ll probably regret that I didn´t go in, but you´ve got to save something to see on future visits. We then walked down to Casa Mila (La Pedrera) another of Gaudi´s masterpieces. It´s pretty, but I have to say that I like his more colorful (mosaic) work better.
After typing this blog in a smoke-filled cibercafe with a gang of teenagers whose language would make sailors blush, we´re headed back to the Plaza Catalunya to meet the bus at 6:30 p.m. Dinner at the hotel at 7:30. Collapse at 8;30 p.m. (Mariana says she´s going to head back to town tonight. I said she must be part vampire.) We´re off to Valencia tomorrow!
Gary pointed out the two most dangerous spots on the route. The first is where the runners make a 90-degree turn from one narrow street onto another narrow street. The second most dangerous point is when everyone is dashing into the bull ring at the end of the race. On the weekends, about 3,000 runners participate, and a bottleneck is created at the entrance. A giant statue of Ernest Hemingway sits just outside of the bullring taking it all in. He´s the one who put Pamplona on the map, so they honored him with a statue.
After walking the route, we went into their plaza mayor, where some sort of street festival was going on. A bicyle-powered centrifugal force amusement ride was a main feature. We watched two young (12ish) boys strapped onto bicycles pedal their way to a complete 360-degree circle. I got dizzy just watching them. Over and over and over they went. It´s what I imagined I could do as a kid swinging, if I just pumped my legs hard enough.
From Pamplona, we continued our journey to Barcelona. Everyone agreed that San Sebastian had been the high point of the trip so far. It is a gorgeous place. The scenery (think stunning ocean view) alone is worth the trip. Throw in the mouth-watering food, the energetic street action and 70 degree temperatures and you´ve got heaven on earth.
Six of us ended our visit in San Sebastian by taking in ¨Cuatro Voces,¨ a flamenco ballet by Eva Yerbabuena, a dancer/choreographer who won the national prize for best flamenco dancer in 2001. (Her footwork was beyond amazing. Sounded like machine guns at times. I didn´t know feet could move so fast with such perfect timing.) She was also featured in a recent film by a British director called ¨The Women of Flamenco¨. I´m not familiar with it, but I want to see it when we return home. The ballet was in the beautifully renovated Victoria Eugenia theatre, which boasts four levels of gilded seating and a cherub-painted ceiling. The voices of the four men who sang while Eva danced gave me goosebumps. Her dance troupe was equally outstanding, especially the male dancers. The two guitarrists, the flautist and the percussionist also played their hearts out.
We arrived at our hotel outside of Barcelona a little after 8 p.m., and we had dinner at 8:30. (We watched ¨Billy Elliott¨ in Spanish with English subtitles on the bus. We also saw most of Austin´s own Richard Linklater´s film, ¨Before Sunrise¨.) The name of our hotel is NH Sant Boi. Lovely. Very modern. Our only complaint is that the hotel is located in an industrial park, far from downtown. We left the hotel at 9 a.m. this morning for a ¨vuelta¨ (circle) around Barcelona. Our first stop was the Parque Guell, Antonio Gaudi´s fanciful park that´s covered in brightly colored mosaics. What a place! It sort of reminds me of San Antonio´s Sunken Gardens...or what the Sunken Gardens could be. We then went to Gaudi´s unfinished cathedral, La Sagrada Familia, whose spires remind me of hand-dripped sandcastles. From there, we went to the top of Monjuic, where we ran into a group of traveling alumni from the University of Texas at Austin. After trading hook ém horns signs, we saw a gorgeous view of the entire city, and then we passed by the Olympic Stadium. I took a picture of the torch for Stacey Johnson, Palo Alto´s Dean of Arts and Humanities, who was an Olympic fencer. The guide reminded us that Barcelona is where Greg Louganis won all of his medals for diving in 1992. I remember what a thrill it was to watch him on TV.
We then were dropped off at Plaza Catalunya, and several of us headed down Las Ramblas to the Boqueria Market. I took a photo of a street performer dressed up like Salvador Dali. He did Dali proud. (I´ll load photos of these different sights when we get back to San Antonio, when I´m not being charged by the minute for an Internet connection.) Blair and I got slices of jamon serrano and Gallego cheese to make a sandwich. Scrumptious. We then sat on the sidewalk, ate our lunch and watched the world pass by.
Our next destination was the Cathedral. Gary told us that street musicians hang out in the area around there. We saw an opera singer, a harpist, and a couple of classical guitarists. The acoustics did justice to the talented performers. We also were able to pat a carved turtle that´s supposed to bring good luck. We then dashed into the Aragon Museum, which had a lovely courtyard and ancient illuminated manuscripts, some dating back to the 1300s...way before Columbus ever made his way to the Americas. Just goes to show you the importance of leaving a record behind.
We then walked up Avenida Porta de l´Angel, toward Plaza de Catalunya. More fantastic street musicians. This group was a clarinetist and a percussionist, who played something I´d never seen before. Sounded like a steel drum, but it was the shape of a walnut. Not exactly round, but rounded. Way cool. A woman was sitting next to the group. She was completely bald and wore sandals with bright orange socks. Quite the fashion statement. I don´t know that I´d be brave enough to pull that look off, but it worked for her.
Nature called, so we dashed into McDonald´s. We paid back their hospitality by purchasing .60 Euro vanilla ice cream cones that we ate on benches outside. While there, we ran into some friends from San Antonio. Small world! Nicolas teaches math and physics at UTSA, but his specialty is architectural theory. He´s in Barcelona to give a talk. His daughter, Sofia, is in Aedan´s dance class. His youngest daughter, Alexia, was with him. After we caught our breath, we headed down Passeig de Gracia to see more of Gaudi´s architecture. His famous Casa Batllo, a home he designed for a wealthy family, is on a block called ¨La Manzana de la Discordia¨ (Block of Discord) because of three different architectural styles that clash. In my humble opinion, Gaudi won the fight hands down. One of our fellow travelers, Kim, paid the 16 Euros to see the inside. I´ll probably regret that I didn´t go in, but you´ve got to save something to see on future visits. We then walked down to Casa Mila (La Pedrera) another of Gaudi´s masterpieces. It´s pretty, but I have to say that I like his more colorful (mosaic) work better.
After typing this blog in a smoke-filled cibercafe with a gang of teenagers whose language would make sailors blush, we´re headed back to the Plaza Catalunya to meet the bus at 6:30 p.m. Dinner at the hotel at 7:30. Collapse at 8;30 p.m. (Mariana says she´s going to head back to town tonight. I said she must be part vampire.) We´re off to Valencia tomorrow!
Saturday, June 16, 2007
San Sebastian, Spain
Although Roddy Stinson would grouse about an expensive ¨foreign junket¨ at taxpayers´ expense, San Antonio´s city planners could learn a thing or two (or a thousand) from those in charge of making Bilbao and San Sebastian two cities that my students and I never want to leave. BTW (by the way), a big thank you to the Express-News for linking our blogs to their website.
On Friday, we left Burgos and drove four hours north to Bilbao, which I hadn´t visited since 1981. The drive was spectacular: rolling hills, blue skies, bright red poppies against green, green grass, and rocky terrain. The lack of visual pollution (billboards) allows you to focus on the gorgeous landscape. We also managed to review the chapters in our history and creative nonfiction textbooks with our students in our classroom on wheels.
Those in charge of Bilbao´s urban planning have made the most out of the last 26 years. Bilbao is on the international map for being the home of Frank Gehry´s architectural masterpiece, the Guggenheim Museum. Ever since I learned about the museum, which opened in 1997, I´ve wanted to visit. I was not disappointed. From Jeff Koons´giant flower-covered dog to Richard Serra´s ¨The Matter of Time¨ installation to a giant spider sculpture by Louise Bourgeois to the building itself, all I can say is WOW. Kim, one of the travelers, said, ¨I wish you´d stop taking me places that make me cry.¨ She also got verklept in the Prado in Madrid. Seriously, at times you feel overwhelmed by the beauty. Serra´s giant installation, which you walk through, encourages you to become part of the art. Beyond cool. Put the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao on your list of places to visit before you die. (Venice and New York City also boast Guggenheim Museums of their own, but they must feel like ugly stepsisters ever since Cinderella, I mean Bilbao, hit the scene.)
Before our 4 p.m. tour of the museum, we had a chance to walk around Bilbao. We started in the Casco Viejo, old town, and made our way over to Zubiarte, a new high-end commercial center (mall), via the pedestrian/bicycle path/electric train passageway that runs alongside the Rio Bilbao. Casey, my mother´s traveling companion, said Aedan, my daughter, was having a grand mall seizure. She was tired of the old town and wanted to get over to the new. After lunch in the mall, we walked back to a children´s playground just outside of the museum where Aedan was able to climb and spin. After our tour, where we were given audio handsets to learn more about the art on display, we jumped on the bus to drive one hour further northeast to San Sebastian. Our hotel is actually in Irun, even closer to the French border than San Sebastian. Dinner, served on white linen table cloths, was at 8:30 p.m. Mariana and I stayed late after dinner to read over everyone´s blogs. So far, so good, but more attention needs to be paid to content along with grammar, punctuation and spelling.
Today, we got to sleep in late, a luxury! We woke up at 8 a.m. so we could meet downstairs for breakfast at 8:45. We left the hotel at 9:30 and drove into San Sebastian, where we picked up our local tour guide Bond, James Bond. (His name is really Eduardo, but that´s how he introduced himself.) What a card! He kept us laughing throughout the city, but he also imparted very interesting (Queen Isabel II lived in San Sebastian in a castle on the Playa de La Concha. She went swimming in the Mar Cantabrico (Cantabrian Ocean) daily, but she didn´t walk down to the beach. A horse-drawn carriage ferried her to and from the water.) and useful (places to eat, bathroom stops) information about the town. This is my third visit to San Sebastian (1982 and 1990 previously), and the city has become even more lovely since those trips. The view from Monte Urgull is breathtaking. Like Bilbao, San Sebastian gives primacy to people, not cars. Wide sidewalks accommodate pedestrians, bicycle riders, skateboarders and in-line skaters. It doesn´t seem that anyone is sitting at home watching television. Everyone (old, young, male and female) is out on the streets enjoying the fresh air and beautiful surroundings. Dogs abound. Too many cute ones to count.
After the tour, Blair, Aedan and I dropped our stuff in a public shower/restroom on the beach and we walked with Steve to the city´s ¨parte vieja¨ (old part) for lunch. I stopped and asked a local where we should eat. He recommended Bar Sport and Munto on Calle Fermin Calbeton. Am I ever glad I asked for his advice! At the Bar Sport, Aedan got a Fanta (orange soda), I got a tinto (red wine), and Blair and Steve ordered a beer (Mahou, a Spanish cerveza). My tinto was .85 Euros, the beer was 1.75 Euros, and the Fanta was 1.90 Euros. We told Aedan, who´s 10, that she´s going to have to start drinking red wine! (BTW, one Euro is $1.40, or at least that is what the exchange rate was at Frost Bank when we left San Antonio.)
For pintxos (pronounced pinchos, which is what they call tapas here in the Basque country), I had a jamon, queso and white asparagus concoction. Delicious. I then asked for a tortilla española, my first since returning to Spain. (Tortilla española is a potato-egg omelette made in a cast iron skillet with onions and olive oil that is then cut into pie-shaped wedges.) It was the best one I´ve ever had. Blair said, ¨Ever?¨ I replied, ¨Ever,¨ and I meant it.
We then went over to Munto, and I asked for membrillo con queso y nuez. (Membrillo is a jelly-like food that´s made of fruit. It was served with a wedge of cheese and a walnut on top of a baguette slice.) We chatted with the locals next to us, and they explained that Eskerrik Asko Etortzeagatik, the phrase printed on the napkin, meant ¨Thank you for coming!¨ The Basque language, Euskera, is not like any other language on the European continent. Some believe it is an ancient language, perhaps tied to Atlantis. No one knows for sure how it developed.
From lunch, Aedan, Blair and I walked over to the Buen Pastor (Good Shepherd) Cathedral. It was closed, which made Aedan happy, because she was ready to hit the beach. Skateboarders were tearing up the wide sidewalks behind the cathedral. It was fun to stop and watch them jump. I walked back with Blair and Aedan to the public showers/restrooms before heading out to find this Internet connection at a place called Zarr@net on the Calle San Lorenzo in the old city. Nice place with plenty of computers.
We´re meeting at the bus at 7:30 p.m. Dinner back at the hotel at 8:30 p.m. Tomorrow, we´re off to Barcelona with a stop in Pamplona. No bulls, but we can pretend, can´t we?
On Friday, we left Burgos and drove four hours north to Bilbao, which I hadn´t visited since 1981. The drive was spectacular: rolling hills, blue skies, bright red poppies against green, green grass, and rocky terrain. The lack of visual pollution (billboards) allows you to focus on the gorgeous landscape. We also managed to review the chapters in our history and creative nonfiction textbooks with our students in our classroom on wheels.
Those in charge of Bilbao´s urban planning have made the most out of the last 26 years. Bilbao is on the international map for being the home of Frank Gehry´s architectural masterpiece, the Guggenheim Museum. Ever since I learned about the museum, which opened in 1997, I´ve wanted to visit. I was not disappointed. From Jeff Koons´giant flower-covered dog to Richard Serra´s ¨The Matter of Time¨ installation to a giant spider sculpture by Louise Bourgeois to the building itself, all I can say is WOW. Kim, one of the travelers, said, ¨I wish you´d stop taking me places that make me cry.¨ She also got verklept in the Prado in Madrid. Seriously, at times you feel overwhelmed by the beauty. Serra´s giant installation, which you walk through, encourages you to become part of the art. Beyond cool. Put the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao on your list of places to visit before you die. (Venice and New York City also boast Guggenheim Museums of their own, but they must feel like ugly stepsisters ever since Cinderella, I mean Bilbao, hit the scene.)
Before our 4 p.m. tour of the museum, we had a chance to walk around Bilbao. We started in the Casco Viejo, old town, and made our way over to Zubiarte, a new high-end commercial center (mall), via the pedestrian/bicycle path/electric train passageway that runs alongside the Rio Bilbao. Casey, my mother´s traveling companion, said Aedan, my daughter, was having a grand mall seizure. She was tired of the old town and wanted to get over to the new. After lunch in the mall, we walked back to a children´s playground just outside of the museum where Aedan was able to climb and spin. After our tour, where we were given audio handsets to learn more about the art on display, we jumped on the bus to drive one hour further northeast to San Sebastian. Our hotel is actually in Irun, even closer to the French border than San Sebastian. Dinner, served on white linen table cloths, was at 8:30 p.m. Mariana and I stayed late after dinner to read over everyone´s blogs. So far, so good, but more attention needs to be paid to content along with grammar, punctuation and spelling.
Today, we got to sleep in late, a luxury! We woke up at 8 a.m. so we could meet downstairs for breakfast at 8:45. We left the hotel at 9:30 and drove into San Sebastian, where we picked up our local tour guide Bond, James Bond. (His name is really Eduardo, but that´s how he introduced himself.) What a card! He kept us laughing throughout the city, but he also imparted very interesting (Queen Isabel II lived in San Sebastian in a castle on the Playa de La Concha. She went swimming in the Mar Cantabrico (Cantabrian Ocean) daily, but she didn´t walk down to the beach. A horse-drawn carriage ferried her to and from the water.) and useful (places to eat, bathroom stops) information about the town. This is my third visit to San Sebastian (1982 and 1990 previously), and the city has become even more lovely since those trips. The view from Monte Urgull is breathtaking. Like Bilbao, San Sebastian gives primacy to people, not cars. Wide sidewalks accommodate pedestrians, bicycle riders, skateboarders and in-line skaters. It doesn´t seem that anyone is sitting at home watching television. Everyone (old, young, male and female) is out on the streets enjoying the fresh air and beautiful surroundings. Dogs abound. Too many cute ones to count.
After the tour, Blair, Aedan and I dropped our stuff in a public shower/restroom on the beach and we walked with Steve to the city´s ¨parte vieja¨ (old part) for lunch. I stopped and asked a local where we should eat. He recommended Bar Sport and Munto on Calle Fermin Calbeton. Am I ever glad I asked for his advice! At the Bar Sport, Aedan got a Fanta (orange soda), I got a tinto (red wine), and Blair and Steve ordered a beer (Mahou, a Spanish cerveza). My tinto was .85 Euros, the beer was 1.75 Euros, and the Fanta was 1.90 Euros. We told Aedan, who´s 10, that she´s going to have to start drinking red wine! (BTW, one Euro is $1.40, or at least that is what the exchange rate was at Frost Bank when we left San Antonio.)
For pintxos (pronounced pinchos, which is what they call tapas here in the Basque country), I had a jamon, queso and white asparagus concoction. Delicious. I then asked for a tortilla española, my first since returning to Spain. (Tortilla española is a potato-egg omelette made in a cast iron skillet with onions and olive oil that is then cut into pie-shaped wedges.) It was the best one I´ve ever had. Blair said, ¨Ever?¨ I replied, ¨Ever,¨ and I meant it.
We then went over to Munto, and I asked for membrillo con queso y nuez. (Membrillo is a jelly-like food that´s made of fruit. It was served with a wedge of cheese and a walnut on top of a baguette slice.) We chatted with the locals next to us, and they explained that Eskerrik Asko Etortzeagatik, the phrase printed on the napkin, meant ¨Thank you for coming!¨ The Basque language, Euskera, is not like any other language on the European continent. Some believe it is an ancient language, perhaps tied to Atlantis. No one knows for sure how it developed.
From lunch, Aedan, Blair and I walked over to the Buen Pastor (Good Shepherd) Cathedral. It was closed, which made Aedan happy, because she was ready to hit the beach. Skateboarders were tearing up the wide sidewalks behind the cathedral. It was fun to stop and watch them jump. I walked back with Blair and Aedan to the public showers/restrooms before heading out to find this Internet connection at a place called Zarr@net on the Calle San Lorenzo in the old city. Nice place with plenty of computers.
We´re meeting at the bus at 7:30 p.m. Dinner back at the hotel at 8:30 p.m. Tomorrow, we´re off to Barcelona with a stop in Pamplona. No bulls, but we can pretend, can´t we?
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Burgos, Spain
To stay healthy, it´s recommended that you walk 10,000 steps a day. In Spain, no problem achieving that goal. Walking around Madrid yesterday, I logged 36,028 steps!My pedometer was panting. No wonder I hit the bed at 10:30 p.m. hecho polvo...ground into dust! What a day! What a city! Madrid has got it going. The energy in the streets is invigorating. People out walking, talking, laughing, enjoying life. I think a pedestrian culture lends itself to a higher (better) quality of life. You get out, rub shoulders, breathe the air, smell the (delicious) smells. You live outside of your hermetically sealed bubble (office, car, house).
We enjoyed an incredible breakfast at our hotel, Tryp Norte near Chamartin train station, and met in the lobby at 9:30 a.m. to take the metro to the Prado. It remains one of the greatest art museums in the world. Mother, Casey, Blair, Aedan and I soaked in the works of art by Velazquez, Goya and Bosch, among others. ¨Las Meninas¨ by Velazquez makes everything else pale in comparison, I think. However, Bosch´s ¨Garden of Earthly Delights¨ still gives me a thrill. When I was in college, I learned that he painted the triptych just after Columbus landed in America. His dark view of the unspoiled land (paradise), human degredation of said land, and hell (think end of the world) pulls you in. Take a look at it when you have a chance.
From the Prado, we walked down Castellana Avenue to the Bank of España metro stop to ride to the Canal metro stop. We dropped off eight pounds (literally) of Aunt Aggie De´s Pralines (made in Sinton, Texas) to my Spanish family that I lived with in 1981-1982. It was great to see Pilar, my Spanish mom who just turned 80 but looks like she´s 60, and Paco, my Spanish father, who also looks much younger than his 80+ years. (Life in Spain definitely agrees with them.) We stayed for a short while since we plan on having a big reunion with the whole family---my five Spanish sisters and their spouses and kids---when we return to Madrid.
We walked down Cea Bermudez, the street I lived on, toward Moncloa, the university area. We then went to El Corte Ingles on Princesa for lunch on the seventh floor. It felt good to sit down after such a long walk, and we enjoyed croquetas de jamon y papas fritas (ham croquettes and fried potatoes). After lunch, we cruised around the store. Didn´t buy anything. One Euro equals $1.40, so everything is very expensive. We then walked over to the Chocolateria San Gines, our favorite spot in Madrid. My mother said, ¨Someone could walk in here with a bad attitude and they´d walk out happy.¨ I agree. Chocolate, especially San Gines´ rich dark chocolate, is ambrosia of the gods. Chocolate y churros at San Gines is enough to make anyone take a plane to Spain. (I´d like to open up a franchise in San Antonio. I think it would go over big.)
From San Gines, we strolled through La Plaza Mayor, filled with artists, living ¨statues¨(people dressed up in costumes who stand completely still until you drop money into their tip jar...we saw Velazquez and a Princess Amadala-type character), people sipping coffee at outdoor cafes, and souvenir shops. One artist I spoke with gave me his card, and I learned that his name was Antonio. I told him that we were from San Antonio, Texas. He reminded me that today was Saint Anthony´s feast day. I´d forgotten. Saludos a San Antonio!(If you ever lose anything, ask Saint Anthony to help you find it. He´ll come through for you.)
We met up with the group at Kilometro Zero en La Puerta del Sol at 6:30 p.m. (All roads in Spain start and are measured from that point.) Dinner at Anonimatto. Delicious roasted chicken and mashed potatoes.
Today we left the hotel at 8:30 a.m. after another grand breakfast. I told my students not to get used to it. Breakfast in Spain in usually very meagre: coffee and a couple of cookies or a hard roll. This breakfast buffet beat all. I especially enjoyed the jamon serrano and tasty queso (cheese), not sure what kind, only that it was delicious. The bus ride to Burgos was about 4 hours. We stopped and took a stretch break on the way. The scenery enroute was spectacular: rolling hills, bright red poppies, ancient stone churches with beautiful bell towers, red tiled roofs, and no visual pollution (billboards) save for the occasional silohuette of a big black bull (toro), a liquor ad.
We have a 4 p.m. tour scheduled at the Cathedral, so I want to finish up this entry so we can grab a bite to eat before then. We´re in a ¨Cibercafe¨ called Caberet. The bartender is very nice, and he told me that he visited the U.S. (Baltimore, DC and NYC) in February. I love that the Internet connects all of us, but I especially love that we are able to travel back and forth to each other´s stomping grounds, forging new friendships and experiencing new sights, sounds, cultures, tastes, and ways of thinking, seeing and being.
We enjoyed an incredible breakfast at our hotel, Tryp Norte near Chamartin train station, and met in the lobby at 9:30 a.m. to take the metro to the Prado. It remains one of the greatest art museums in the world. Mother, Casey, Blair, Aedan and I soaked in the works of art by Velazquez, Goya and Bosch, among others. ¨Las Meninas¨ by Velazquez makes everything else pale in comparison, I think. However, Bosch´s ¨Garden of Earthly Delights¨ still gives me a thrill. When I was in college, I learned that he painted the triptych just after Columbus landed in America. His dark view of the unspoiled land (paradise), human degredation of said land, and hell (think end of the world) pulls you in. Take a look at it when you have a chance.
From the Prado, we walked down Castellana Avenue to the Bank of España metro stop to ride to the Canal metro stop. We dropped off eight pounds (literally) of Aunt Aggie De´s Pralines (made in Sinton, Texas) to my Spanish family that I lived with in 1981-1982. It was great to see Pilar, my Spanish mom who just turned 80 but looks like she´s 60, and Paco, my Spanish father, who also looks much younger than his 80+ years. (Life in Spain definitely agrees with them.) We stayed for a short while since we plan on having a big reunion with the whole family---my five Spanish sisters and their spouses and kids---when we return to Madrid.
We walked down Cea Bermudez, the street I lived on, toward Moncloa, the university area. We then went to El Corte Ingles on Princesa for lunch on the seventh floor. It felt good to sit down after such a long walk, and we enjoyed croquetas de jamon y papas fritas (ham croquettes and fried potatoes). After lunch, we cruised around the store. Didn´t buy anything. One Euro equals $1.40, so everything is very expensive. We then walked over to the Chocolateria San Gines, our favorite spot in Madrid. My mother said, ¨Someone could walk in here with a bad attitude and they´d walk out happy.¨ I agree. Chocolate, especially San Gines´ rich dark chocolate, is ambrosia of the gods. Chocolate y churros at San Gines is enough to make anyone take a plane to Spain. (I´d like to open up a franchise in San Antonio. I think it would go over big.)
From San Gines, we strolled through La Plaza Mayor, filled with artists, living ¨statues¨(people dressed up in costumes who stand completely still until you drop money into their tip jar...we saw Velazquez and a Princess Amadala-type character), people sipping coffee at outdoor cafes, and souvenir shops. One artist I spoke with gave me his card, and I learned that his name was Antonio. I told him that we were from San Antonio, Texas. He reminded me that today was Saint Anthony´s feast day. I´d forgotten. Saludos a San Antonio!(If you ever lose anything, ask Saint Anthony to help you find it. He´ll come through for you.)
We met up with the group at Kilometro Zero en La Puerta del Sol at 6:30 p.m. (All roads in Spain start and are measured from that point.) Dinner at Anonimatto. Delicious roasted chicken and mashed potatoes.
Today we left the hotel at 8:30 a.m. after another grand breakfast. I told my students not to get used to it. Breakfast in Spain in usually very meagre: coffee and a couple of cookies or a hard roll. This breakfast buffet beat all. I especially enjoyed the jamon serrano and tasty queso (cheese), not sure what kind, only that it was delicious. The bus ride to Burgos was about 4 hours. We stopped and took a stretch break on the way. The scenery enroute was spectacular: rolling hills, bright red poppies, ancient stone churches with beautiful bell towers, red tiled roofs, and no visual pollution (billboards) save for the occasional silohuette of a big black bull (toro), a liquor ad.
We have a 4 p.m. tour scheduled at the Cathedral, so I want to finish up this entry so we can grab a bite to eat before then. We´re in a ¨Cibercafe¨ called Caberet. The bartender is very nice, and he told me that he visited the U.S. (Baltimore, DC and NYC) in February. I love that the Internet connects all of us, but I especially love that we are able to travel back and forth to each other´s stomping grounds, forging new friendships and experiencing new sights, sounds, cultures, tastes, and ways of thinking, seeing and being.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Madrid, Spain: We´re here!
It´s good to be ¨home¨! (Madrid was my home during my junior year of college, and it always feels good to be back.) We just ate our fill of paella, carne con papas, and neopolitan ice cream at El Museo de Vino near the Puerta del Sol. Now we´re typing in our blogs on deadline. Gary, our tour director, wants us to meet at 9 p.m. to head back to the hotel.
The flights from San Antonio to Newark and Newark to Madrid were good. Cramped, but good. Everyone´s luggage, but mine and Sarah´s, arrived without a problem, and ours arrived on the next flight. (Thank goodness! The Continental employee who helped us was an American--from Honolulu--who´s lived in Madrid for the past 25 years. I told her that I understood why.) On the plane, we met a group from the Canary Islands, who´d been visiting San Antonio for a week. They did a special misa folklorico (folkloric mass) at San Fernando Cathedral while they were in town. I´m sorry I didn´t know anything about it, or I would have gone. I believe they also performed at the Folklife Festival. Nice people! They invited us to visit the Canaries on our next trip. I´d love to take them up on the offer.
From the hotel, we got on a tour bus and traveled down Castellana, a lovely tree-lined boulevard with beautiful red and yellow flowers designed to look like the flag of Spain. We passed the Real Madrid Soccer Stadium, a giant El Corte Ingles (with a mermaid billboard), a Botero sculpture (giant hand), the U.S. Embassy, a square dedicated to Christopher Columbus, the Palacio de Comunicaciones--an unbelievably beautiful post office, and Cibeles fountain. We then turned onto Alcala and then onto Gran Via, two of Madrid´s main streets (think Fifth Avenue). Tons of shops, too many McDonald´s, and giant billboards for American films (Ocean´s 13, Spiderman 3, and Pirates of the Caribbean 3).
We traveled to the Palacio Real, Spain´s royal palace, for a guided tour. Until I read ¨The History of Spain,¨ I didn´t realize the king who built the palace was originally from France, so that´s why the palace looks so French. Think Versailles. Rich tapestries in gold, silver and silk, parquet wood floors, marble for days, gold everywhere, painted ceilings, and on and on. The ¨Smoking Room¨ is my favorite room. Chinese-style enamel everywhere. The gigantic dining hall isn´t too shabby either. (I would love to go to a state dinner there some day!)
From the Palacio Real, we made a stop at La Plaza de España to see a sculpture of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. When we return to Madrid at the end of the trip, our hotel will be nearby. Great location, close to everything I want to see and visit.
Dinner at the Museo de Vino was quite good. I sat with some of our Alaskan busmates. I also met a family from San Antonio whose daughter is studying in Madrid for the summer. Small world!
Stay tuned for more scoop. Right now, we´re all tired after our all-day travel across the Atlantic. (Although not as tired as our friends from Alaska. It took them 26 hours of non-stop travel to get here!) It´s good to be back in España. Thanks for traveling with us!
The flights from San Antonio to Newark and Newark to Madrid were good. Cramped, but good. Everyone´s luggage, but mine and Sarah´s, arrived without a problem, and ours arrived on the next flight. (Thank goodness! The Continental employee who helped us was an American--from Honolulu--who´s lived in Madrid for the past 25 years. I told her that I understood why.) On the plane, we met a group from the Canary Islands, who´d been visiting San Antonio for a week. They did a special misa folklorico (folkloric mass) at San Fernando Cathedral while they were in town. I´m sorry I didn´t know anything about it, or I would have gone. I believe they also performed at the Folklife Festival. Nice people! They invited us to visit the Canaries on our next trip. I´d love to take them up on the offer.
From the hotel, we got on a tour bus and traveled down Castellana, a lovely tree-lined boulevard with beautiful red and yellow flowers designed to look like the flag of Spain. We passed the Real Madrid Soccer Stadium, a giant El Corte Ingles (with a mermaid billboard), a Botero sculpture (giant hand), the U.S. Embassy, a square dedicated to Christopher Columbus, the Palacio de Comunicaciones--an unbelievably beautiful post office, and Cibeles fountain. We then turned onto Alcala and then onto Gran Via, two of Madrid´s main streets (think Fifth Avenue). Tons of shops, too many McDonald´s, and giant billboards for American films (Ocean´s 13, Spiderman 3, and Pirates of the Caribbean 3).
We traveled to the Palacio Real, Spain´s royal palace, for a guided tour. Until I read ¨The History of Spain,¨ I didn´t realize the king who built the palace was originally from France, so that´s why the palace looks so French. Think Versailles. Rich tapestries in gold, silver and silk, parquet wood floors, marble for days, gold everywhere, painted ceilings, and on and on. The ¨Smoking Room¨ is my favorite room. Chinese-style enamel everywhere. The gigantic dining hall isn´t too shabby either. (I would love to go to a state dinner there some day!)
From the Palacio Real, we made a stop at La Plaza de España to see a sculpture of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. When we return to Madrid at the end of the trip, our hotel will be nearby. Great location, close to everything I want to see and visit.
Dinner at the Museo de Vino was quite good. I sat with some of our Alaskan busmates. I also met a family from San Antonio whose daughter is studying in Madrid for the summer. Small world!
Stay tuned for more scoop. Right now, we´re all tired after our all-day travel across the Atlantic. (Although not as tired as our friends from Alaska. It took them 26 hours of non-stop travel to get here!) It´s good to be back in España. Thanks for traveling with us!
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
San Antonio, Texas
This week at Palo Alto College has been a journalistic boot camp. The students are learning how to write like journalists, which is a very different style of writing than what they have done in their English, History and Government classes.
Yesterday, we reviewed what makes something newsworthy (impact, proximity, timeliness, prominence, novelty, conflict, cooperation/consensus, information, and common experience) and how to prioritize facts/information. They also learned how to write a lead, the opening paragraph in a news story, using only 19-20 words. We talked about journalists' rights (First Amendment) and responsibilities (accuracy and fairness). Roy Peter Clark's "The Writing Process" (sniff around, explore ideas, collect evidence, find a focus, select the best stuff, recognize an order, write a draft, and revise/clarify) provided a road map for their writing. "Be Specific" and "Don't Tell, but Show," chapters from Natalie Goldberg's book "Writing Down the Bones," also gave concrete examples of what makes writing excellent.
Mariana lead discussion of the first chapter in "The Story of Spain" by Mark Williams. I have to say I love her choice of texts. Williams knows how to craft an engaging tale that makes you want to read on. What a soap opera the history of Spain has been!
Today, the students talked about what stories they'd like to research (report) and write about in their lifetimes, and I was impressed by the range of interesting ideas. They also talked about stories in their neighborhoods that are under reported (or not reported on at all) that they'd like to cover or see more coverage on. We then reviewed the lead exercise they completed at home. Passive voice versus active voice has been placed on tomorrow's agenda. I passed out an inverted pyramid story exercise for them to complete at home today. Their challenge is to write a one-page news story with provided facts and quotes.
Mariana then lead discussion on the second chapter of Williams' book. We learned about the Roman's influence on the Iberian peninsula. It's so amazing to think that the Romans built the aqueduct in Segovia at the end of the first century/beginning of the second century, and it's still standing...almost 2,000 years later! The Romans, who were very big on infrastructure, also built roads and bridges.
Tomorrow is our last class day at Palo Alto College. We'll be learning on the run while we are in Spain. Time on our motor coach will provide us with ample opportunity to continue our discussions. Plus, we'll be learning in each and every place we visit. For those who would like to travel along with us, here's our itinerary:
12 Madrid (Orientation/Prado)
13 Madrid (Sightseeing/Palacio Real)
14 Santo Domingo de Silos/Burgos
15 Bilbao/San Sebastian
16 San Sebastian
17 Pamplona/Barcelona
18 Barcelona
19 Valencia
20 Granada
21 Granada/Torremolinos
22 Torremolinos
23 Sevilla
24 Sevilla
25 Cordoba/Puerto Lapice/Madrid
26 Madrid
27 Madrid
28 Madrid
29 Madrid
30 Madrid
1 Madrid
2 Depart Madrid
Yesterday, we reviewed what makes something newsworthy (impact, proximity, timeliness, prominence, novelty, conflict, cooperation/consensus, information, and common experience) and how to prioritize facts/information. They also learned how to write a lead, the opening paragraph in a news story, using only 19-20 words. We talked about journalists' rights (First Amendment) and responsibilities (accuracy and fairness). Roy Peter Clark's "The Writing Process" (sniff around, explore ideas, collect evidence, find a focus, select the best stuff, recognize an order, write a draft, and revise/clarify) provided a road map for their writing. "Be Specific" and "Don't Tell, but Show," chapters from Natalie Goldberg's book "Writing Down the Bones," also gave concrete examples of what makes writing excellent.
Mariana lead discussion of the first chapter in "The Story of Spain" by Mark Williams. I have to say I love her choice of texts. Williams knows how to craft an engaging tale that makes you want to read on. What a soap opera the history of Spain has been!
Today, the students talked about what stories they'd like to research (report) and write about in their lifetimes, and I was impressed by the range of interesting ideas. They also talked about stories in their neighborhoods that are under reported (or not reported on at all) that they'd like to cover or see more coverage on. We then reviewed the lead exercise they completed at home. Passive voice versus active voice has been placed on tomorrow's agenda. I passed out an inverted pyramid story exercise for them to complete at home today. Their challenge is to write a one-page news story with provided facts and quotes.
Mariana then lead discussion on the second chapter of Williams' book. We learned about the Roman's influence on the Iberian peninsula. It's so amazing to think that the Romans built the aqueduct in Segovia at the end of the first century/beginning of the second century, and it's still standing...almost 2,000 years later! The Romans, who were very big on infrastructure, also built roads and bridges.
Tomorrow is our last class day at Palo Alto College. We'll be learning on the run while we are in Spain. Time on our motor coach will provide us with ample opportunity to continue our discussions. Plus, we'll be learning in each and every place we visit. For those who would like to travel along with us, here's our itinerary:
12 Madrid (Orientation/Prado)
13 Madrid (Sightseeing/Palacio Real)
14 Santo Domingo de Silos/Burgos
15 Bilbao/San Sebastian
16 San Sebastian
17 Pamplona/Barcelona
18 Barcelona
19 Valencia
20 Granada
21 Granada/Torremolinos
22 Torremolinos
23 Sevilla
24 Sevilla
25 Cordoba/Puerto Lapice/Madrid
26 Madrid
27 Madrid
28 Madrid
29 Madrid
30 Madrid
1 Madrid
2 Depart Madrid
Monday, June 4, 2007
San Antonio, Texas
We're off and running! A week from today, we'll be on our way to the Kingdom of Spain.
Mariana Ornelas, a professor of Humanities, and I, Denise Barkis Richter, a professor of Journalism/Communications at Palo Alto College, are leading a group of 13 students to Spain during the first summer session.
Today, the students read "A rat in my soup" by Peter Hessler and "In Madrid, there's no such thing as too much ham" by Daisann McLane to understand the type of writing that they'll be learning how to do while we're studying and traveling abroad. Both stories feature amazing descriptions that incorporate all five senses, abundant humor, complete dialogue, interesting facts/information, and make-you-want-to-continue-reading leads, the opening sentence, that hook you in. The students discussed what makes these stories excellent, and we aspire to write like this during our time on the road and here in San Antonio.
My hopes and dreams for this study abroad are that each student traveler will return to San Antonio a savvier world citizen with an appreciation for the people, culture, language, lifestyle and history of the Iberian peninsula. I spent my junior year of college in Madrid, Spain, in the early 1980s, and I firmly believe that there is no better educational opportunity. This experience will stay with these students the rest of their lives, and I am excited and happy for them.
I imagine that Spain will be as delightful as ever. This will be my fifth trip to Spain, and I never tire of it. I can't wait to visit some of my old haunts. In addition, I look forward to exploring some new places. Thanks for joining our adventure! We hope that our blogs give you an insight into Spain that you might never have had before. Welcome!
Mariana Ornelas, a professor of Humanities, and I, Denise Barkis Richter, a professor of Journalism/Communications at Palo Alto College, are leading a group of 13 students to Spain during the first summer session.
Today, the students read "A rat in my soup" by Peter Hessler and "In Madrid, there's no such thing as too much ham" by Daisann McLane to understand the type of writing that they'll be learning how to do while we're studying and traveling abroad. Both stories feature amazing descriptions that incorporate all five senses, abundant humor, complete dialogue, interesting facts/information, and make-you-want-to-continue-reading leads, the opening sentence, that hook you in. The students discussed what makes these stories excellent, and we aspire to write like this during our time on the road and here in San Antonio.
My hopes and dreams for this study abroad are that each student traveler will return to San Antonio a savvier world citizen with an appreciation for the people, culture, language, lifestyle and history of the Iberian peninsula. I spent my junior year of college in Madrid, Spain, in the early 1980s, and I firmly believe that there is no better educational opportunity. This experience will stay with these students the rest of their lives, and I am excited and happy for them.
I imagine that Spain will be as delightful as ever. This will be my fifth trip to Spain, and I never tire of it. I can't wait to visit some of my old haunts. In addition, I look forward to exploring some new places. Thanks for joining our adventure! We hope that our blogs give you an insight into Spain that you might never have had before. Welcome!
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