I have been extremely inefficient with keeping an up to date journal with this trip. While I have a good while to sit down and write about what has been going on, I’m going to try to remember the details about the many exciting and wonderful things that have occurred while I have been on this trip.
The last major event left the Center for Cross Cultural Study group in Merida, Caraceres and Trujillo Spain. This was our first major trip of the semester. The next one will be the second week of October, when we will travel to Cordoba, Spain. This past trip was very beautiful. We left Friday morning, very early morning, and traveled for 3 hours to Merida. After a very interesting and….dirty rest stop, we arrived in Merida for an afternoon filled with amazing Roman ruins and an abundance of information. Merida is very well preserved. I don’t have the exact dates of Merida, but when Rome conquered Spain during the Roman empire, Merida was one of the first cities as well as Iberica , to be established as Roman rule. What is left of Merida is an arena used to gladiator wars and animal fights, the same as in Iberica, and a theater where performances were shown. The theater was amazing and extremely well preserved. Before we left, we were taken to the Roman museum in Merida where many of the actual statues are kept. The statues actually remaining in the original places are replecas. Due to the natural elements, archeologists remove many of the original statues for fear that more harm will actually be done. As you can see from the pictures, many of the arms and legs are missing. Over time, the statues have fallen or other things have occurred (even looting) leaving the statues in pieces. The museum was constructed in 1986 to preserve the remaining pieces of Merida as well as archeological discoveries.
After a lunch (courtesy of Rosario) break and a little time to roam, we hopped back on the bus and headed to our hotel in Caraceres. Once again, the hotel was amazing, with a wonderful shower ( which I totally took advantage of.). The beds were more or less comfortable, and all of the meals we ate there were edible. We’ll get into the food issue later…
One thing I realized is that Andalucia, or the south of Spain has a completely different flavor than the rest of Europe. When we left Andalucia and went further into the northern parts of Spain, I really felt as if I was in Europe. Trujillo was beautiful with a tremendous castle and old houses that were built for the upper classes hundreds and hundreds of years before. I was in awe with all of the architecture. It’s not that I don’t love Sevilla, because I do, it’s an entirely separate entity with a different style all of its own, but the Spain that I thought I would be traveling to was Trujillo and Caceres. It came straight out of a fairytale. I love these cities so much the only way to describe them is in the pictures I took.
One thing I can describe in words is my first experience in a Spanish club…not all I expected it to be.
Ernesto, our professor that came with us on this trip told us at our meeting that he could show us where the best clubs were in Caraceres, his sister lives there. So after our dinner of chicken and other Spanish-esque cuisine, a bunch of us ran up to our rooms and began changing. This was around 10 o’ clock, thinking we could walk around and find a bar or something before the clubs opened. Emily and I got dressed in our room, and Kate was getting herself ready, Erica was staying in for the night to write in her journal. After a while we went nextdoor to get Kate and see what we wanted to do. We hung out in Kate and Erica’s room for a while tried to watch TV but that amount of Porn on Spanish television is disgusting. We actually ended up unplugging the TV and turning it around, it was really really bad. Around 12 we started to walk around Caraceres and look for the bars. We weren’t going to drink, we just wanted to sit there. We joined up with another group of girls, and after being indecisive for about an hour, Kate asked a native young girl to show us where the clubs were that Ernesto had told us about. We went down to this little plaza and asked the bouncers when it would open. Of course, as usual, nothing opens in Spain until about 2 or 2:30. We sat at a skeevy bar until about 1:30 We got in, some girls got drinks, and we stood there, literally for about an hour. NOONE WAS THERE. So we left…and went to the club under our hotel. There were a lot of people, it was smokey, and the guys were gross. We danced, watched other people dance, tried to talk but we had to scream, it just wasn’t a good time. We were tired, not in the mood to bop around forever. It was overall kind of lame. We all missed the buzz of Sevilla and knowing where we were. We decided to go to bed because we had another long busride the next morning. Caraceres was awesome, but clubbing scene…not so much.
The next morning we got up and ate breakfast at the hotel. It was pretty good! I got a box of cereal to bring back to the US for my classroom. I’ve been trying to pick up recognizable American items that are made for Spain, like cereal, soda cans, and other things. We got back on the bus and drove to Trujillo. Trujillo is amazing. We took a tour of a convent (hahaha) and then walked up this really really steep cobblestone road to the castle. It was indescribable. To know that I was ontop of an ancient castle built to protect an entire fortress was amazing. Men used to sit at the top of these towers and shoot bows and arrows down at their enemies. There was a mote underneath the castle that we could walk through (there was a glass walkway above the water). Afterwards we went up to the top of the castle and could look down at the city above. There was a church inside the castle that was beautiful and tranquil. It was nice and quiet and you could sit and contemplate about what you were experiencing. Something that I’ve been appreciating here. I don’t get to do that a lot at school. After we were done with the castle, the center had set up a wonderful sit down lunch at a fancy restaurant for us. For some reason we kept sitting with people who complained all the time, and after a while it got to be annoying…Ernesto took some photos for us. After that the waiters came out and served each of us individually. We had some “tinto de verano” which is basically red wine and carbonated water, Rosario serves it with lunch each day. I’m beginning to like red wine, but the cheap box stuff. The hotel had some more expensive wine, but it was gross. Lunch was veal, which I wasn’t thrilled about, but it didn’t taste too bad. It was more of the concept. I had to get over being really picky here about what I eat. Most of the time I just don’t ask, it’s better not to know. But I’ll get on the food topic in a little bit.
We then walked around the town for a little bit and met up with everyone at around 1:30. The bus was ready, so we hopped back on and made our way home, even stopping at the skeevy rest stop again. We got back to Sevilla around 7 o’clock. Emily and I stopped in Nervion to look for shoes. Early this month I stepped in a sewage puddle and have been complaining about needing new shoes now for about 3 weeks. So we went to el Corte Ingles, but I wasn’t about to spend 50 euros (60-70 bucks) for a pair of cheap shoes. On our way back to our houses, we stopped at a little tiny zapatoria (shoe store) and looked for shoes. I found a pair of cute flats with beads (very “Spanish”) for 12.50. I got a pair of black and brown ones. They’re surprisingly comfortable. I can walk on cobblestone and they match everything, not to mention they’ll be VERY easy to pack when I come home. We got back to our houses around 9 just in time for dinner. Now we can get to the concept of food…
Erica and I stopped and talked to Rosario about our trip. She had been over at her daughters house and didn’t know what time we would be home. If she’s running late, she normally just throws something together for us. She had bought some little microwave pizzas for us that are really easy for her to make. That’s great, we don’t like her to go to all sorts of trouble for us late at night. We can’t eat that much at 10 or 11 at night anyway (which is generally when people eat dinner in Spain). So we thought it would be fine to just microwave the little pizzas. She got them out, we threw them in the microwave, and thought Hey, these look normal, then we smelled something really fishy. Literally. These were not normal pizzas. When we took them out of the microwave, there were little tiny shrimp on the pizza. We sat down, looked at each other, and started cutting. As Erica whispered to me “it’s a sea-food graveyard”. I mean, there was tuna, shrimp, little red things that looked like the inside of a crab-cake….who knows what was in there. We didn’t know what to do. I mean, we couldn’t eat this. Normally if something is unusual, we try it. We’re hear for a cultural experience, but this was cruel and unusual punishment. Rosario had been busy helping Abuela, her mom that lives in the house with us. She’s very old and sickly, so Rosario takes care of her. She’s bedridden, so we don’t see her very much. Sometimes we peak our heads in just to say hi, but usually she’s not able to take visitors. Erica ran into the kitchen and grabbed a plastic bag, and we sat back down. We were trying to think of how to do this strategically. Rosario kept coming into the diningroom to talk to us, so we didn’t want her to know that we didn’t like it. Gradually we cut up the pizzas and put small amounts into the bags. Finally, we got all of the contents into the bag, and Erica ran it upstairs to our room. We told Rosario that we were going to go out with the other girls from Nervion, Emily and Kate, and she said good night. That’s when Erica ran back upstairs, we grabbed the food, some money, and our keys, and ran across the street to the bar and restaurant. We threw the sea-food graveyards into the dumpster, and ordered a real pizza. We sat and talked, ate some pizza (which was nice and cheap) then met up with “las chicas de Loli” Emily and Kate. They wanted some icecream, so we went to Gran Plaza and sat and chilled out. Loli, Emily and Kate’s house mom was hit by a car a little while ago. The poor woman is 72 (we think) and broke her pelvis, knee, and wrist. She can’t sit up for 2 months, otherwise the rest of the time we’re hear. Needless to say, there was a while where noone knew where Kate and Emily were going to be living. Loli’s family moved in and said the girls didn’t need to move. So they’ve just been helping out Loli and the family. There’s two little kids in the house, I think they’re 8 and 12. They get to be a lot to handle, so Emily and Kate sometimes come over here to get away, or we all go out to get away. The other day the little girl in the house rewound Kate’s camara, so now she doesn’t have any pictures. Luckily Erica and have digital photos we can mail her. Loli’s doing pretty well so far. It’s hard to see her not be able to move or to be moved. She’s getting surgery October 10, so we’ll see what’s going to happen. We don’t know if Emily and Kate are going to have to move or not. We hope not, but we’re just going to have to wait.
My roommate Erica’s been pretty sick. She ended up finding out she’s allergic to shellfish, which was the main contents of the sea food pizza (which reered it’s ugly head tonight again) and the majority of last week. Rosario was out of control this week with Erica being sick. She loves to take care of people, which is a wonderful quality, but she doesn’t trust doctors. She claimed that Erica’s medicine wasn’t right and called over her nurse friend, who we think convinced her everything is ok. She was completely impossible to deal with Thursday, but Erica was polite but stern with her and told her everything was undercontrol and she didn’t want Rosario to talk about it anymore. Rosario dropped it and now everything is pretty much ok. Erica got some medicine and now can stop scratching layers off of her skin. The past few days were really rough for her, but everything hopefully will be ok.
I’m adjusting rather smoothly. Every once in a while I just want to drop this country and go home. Spain is corrupt at some points. The language drives me crazy lately and so does the culture. Sometimes I don’t feel like I’m progressing at all in learning the language and it gets to be discouraging. Rosario has never thought that I understand what she says because I’m generally a quiet person, and always gives directions and talks more to Erica. When I start conversations with her, she tries to finish my sentences and I feel like I don’t get the practice I need because she won’t let me talk. I have made an attempt to talk to her, and it’s getting better, but it’s still frustrating when she tries to get Erica to tell me what’s going on. Erica even tells her that I understand but needless to say, Rosario is a stubborn person.
One thing that has REALLY gotten to me here is the way in which American’s and the US is treated here. I’m going to try to keep this short, because it’s almost 2 am here, and my battery will probably die, but I get really angry about this. Rosario tells us every time that we watch the news that we’re lucky we’re in Spain right now because the US doesn’t report everything that goes on within the US and we’ll get more information here. When hurricane Rita hit, Rosario was CONVINCED that the US wasn’t reporting all of the damages and death tolls that we were seeing here in Spain. We tried to convince her that it wasn’t true, but she wouldn’t hear of it. When there were protests against the war in Iraq, the only thing that was shown on TV were the people saying Bush was horrible and the war needs to end. There were 2 seconds of feed covering supporters. Generelly it’s the same in the US with the whole “support or don’t support Bush” depending on what station you’re watching, but here there are two stations, one station for the afternoon news. The US does not have a good image here. American’s are often treated poorly here too. The other day Kate was in the grocery store when the cashier asked here where she was from. She told him the US and he was going on and on about all of the weather problems. When he finished talking he said, well you must be really embarrassed, or at least you should be. That’s just some of the problems we have here. Needless to say, we defend our country and try not to listen to all of the crap people say. It’s a shame our country’s in that position, but Spain’s got its problems too.
Here’s another story….Spain has an obsession, or what could be referred to as a problem, with “caca” or poop. Erica has now dedicated an entire portion of her website to Spain’s sidewalks and “caca”. In the US, dogs are usually kept in the house or kept on leashes. There are laws that say dogs need to either be kept on leashes and people should pick up after their dogs. In Spain, that’s not the case. Dogs usually just roam the streets at night and their owners follow behind. The dogs go to the bathroom wherever they please and during the day, street cleaners come by and wipe the remains into these pots that orange trees are planted in. It’s really hard to explain. Needless to say, for American’s it’s kind of gross.
Then we have Carlos, Rosario’s little grandson. He’s only about one, but we have a situation on our hands here. As Carlito (Rosario’s name for him) approaches the “terrible twos” we can’t keep clothes on him. Ima, his mom, drops him off at Rosario’s house fully clothed, with a diaper and everything. Not even five minutes after Ima leaves, Carlos is running around butt naked. Normally Rosario just throws a pair of underpants on him, and Carlos is good to go. The only problem is Carlos is only 1, meaning he’s not potty trained. Again, we have an issue with “caca” and pee all over the house. There’s a very different attitude towards the bodily functions in this country. Rosario just laughs and one of us will clean it up…not that we really enjoy doing this. I have to give credit to Rosario, she has a naked, unpotty-trained kid running around the house, a mother who is bedridden and can’t do anything, and two confused American’s living in her house. So basically you have a kid going to the bathroom all over the house, and a crazy lady screaming. We try to help out with Carlos sometimes. If Abuela, the grandnother, starts calling for Rosario, we’ll play with Carlos and keep our eye on him. The other day Rosario dropped a plate when she was getting lunch for us, and Carlos started playing with the pieces. I grabbed him and was holding him for a little bit, when Rosario was laughing at me. She came over and pointed out that yes, I had just been “cacad”. Carlos still doesn’t wear clothes; in fact as I’m typing this Carlos is running around butt naked still, probably leaving surprises for us later. It can seriously be like having a little dog.
This weekend has been pretty uneventful. We have three-day weekends here so we can do a little traveling through Spain. Thursday night I had a very nice practice session in my room when no one was home. Then Kate and I had a true cultural experience. We were on our way to the center to meet for a Flamenco concert when our bus stopped and wasn’t moving for a while. It ended up there was a huge revolt outside of the cathedral. The president of Spain was at the Alcazar giving a speech and protestors had stopped traffic and were marching down La Avenida del Constitucion. It was interesting. A man gave me a pamphlet and from what I could gather, the different races in Spain feel as if they’re not receiving the same rights as other races. There was also another protest concerning Spain and it’s choice to join the Euro currency. Spain did this three years ago and now their economy is suffering. People are angry and want to go back to pesetas. I’m gradually beginning to understand it, but I have to do some more research concerning Spain and its political background. Afterwards we had a Flamenco show organized by the school at this beautiful hotel in Santa Cruz. I came back and my roommate was pretty sick. Friday we went to La Giralda with Ernesto. It was amazing. We climbed to the top of the tower and could see the whole city of Sevilla down below. The cathedral is the largest cathedral in the world. There are actual multiple sanctuaries inside. It was amazing to see a 12th century building that is still standing. In the center of the cathedral, there are multiple organs that are AMAZING. The pipes go all the way to the ceiling and the choir loft is right next to them. In the center of the choir chamber is a huge music stand for the songbooks. Like we learned in MRB (hahaha) there used to be one songbook that everyone could see for the chants. There were even separate huge wooden chairs for the members of the choir. It was beautiful. It’s really hard to explain in words the beauty of some of these monuments. As much as I sound like I just make fun of everything I experience here, it’s really amazing to walk through these building that are ancient beyond my understanding. Until I came here, I had no idea what history was. People live in neighborhoods older than America itself. It’s indescribable. I’d love to explain this to everyone, but I don’t have the words to adequately explain what I see or feel.
Saturday was fun. Next to the cathedral is another famous monument here in Sevilla, La Alcazar. The Alcazar is a really hard to explain. The actual building was used as basically a castle for the king and queen when Sevilla was its own entity. When Spain was developing, Sevilla and other cities like Cordoba and Granada treated themselves as separate countries and governing bodies. We’re learning about this in Spanish Civilization and Spanish-American Civilization. The part that attracts tourists to La Alcazar are the amazing gardens throughout the Alcazar. They are beyond amazing. Sevilla is a huge city and there is really no foliage except for skinny orange trees on the streets, like in NYC with the skinny little trees. In the middle of the city, there’s this hidden garden that you wouldn’t even know existed. We played in the mazes around gardens, sat for a while in front of the fountains and fish ponds, and walked through rose gardens. The best part about the gardens-they’re free for students. A lot of the students in Sevilla take their homework to the Alcazars and just stay there all day. We’re seriously going to do it because it’s amazing to just sit and clear your mind. We spent the night in the house, reading, and doing girly stuff, Erica’s slowly getting better, so she wanted to rest. I was more than happy to do my nails and hair.
Today’s Sunday, October 2, 2005 (10 days until I’m 21). I’m doing what we usually do on Sunday’s…absolutely nothing right now. You can’t really do anything here on Sundays. The only places that are open on are churches and very scarcely…tapa bars. We’ve gone to church a couple times, but when it’s in Spanish, it’s hard to get the message, plus we’re not Catholic. I got up early this morning and sat of the balcony of the house. It was cool out and cloudy. It was nice to let my mind go. I could hear Carlos causing problems downstairs and Erica was still asleep. The city is dead on Sundays, so it was nice to hear the birds and watch people come out to see if it had rained. Sevilla has not had rain since last November, meaning there’s been a drought for almost a year. Conservation of water is a big deal here, and understandably so. It’s hard for everyone, especially for Erica and I who are not used to very short showers with no water pressure. We haven’t felt clean in a while…
I hope this update lets everyone in on what’s been going on. It’s difficult to explain the million things that go on here. I feel so lucky to get to experience. I miss home a lot sometimes, but I want to take advantage of this experience for the short while I’m here. As always, I think about everyone all the time and hope everyone is safe and sound. I love hearing from everyone! Love you all!
~Casey
|
