Gastronomy 3: Sevilla

One of our priorities while in Sevilla was to get a taste of the widely reputed Sevillan dishes. I can safely say I am tired of the Madrid pork (they sell every cut you could think of—whole pigs, even, hooves, brains, ears, chunks of skin, bacon, lomo, white strips of fat, every kind of chorizo imaginable—except for the classic American pork chop). I had been told that the vegetables were to be found in the south, that the seafood was killer. So I set about doing a little research.

Many of the drinks of choice are similar to those of Madrid’s: calimochi (red wine mixed with coca-cola), tinto de verano (“red wine of summer” or red wine mixed with sugar and lemon (or as most places do it now, red wine mixed with lemon Fanta)), sangria (red wine mixed with brandy, sugar, and various fruits), cerveza con límon (beer mixed with lemon Fanta), among a small assortment of beers and chilled red wine. The south of Spain, however, is also known for their sherry. They have several popular kinds. We stuck to ordering vino fino, a light, dry white sherry. Once we figured out what we liked, we specifically ordered Manzanilla, which was the driest in our opinion. I have nothing bad to say about these delicious beverages except occasionally one might find a brand that leans to the sweet side. Craig’s student’s, however, insisted that we were CRAZY to drink straight sherry and that it should, of course, be blended with Sprite. I’ve had enough of diluted wine, thankyouverymuch!!!

The first day, we missed lunch. When dinner time finally rolled around about 9:00, I was studying the tour guide’s guide to culinary treasures and was literally salivating at the pictures. The most appealing photo was that of a nice looking stew. Beef, I thought, I need beef!! Upon further reading I found it was ropo de toro, or bull’s tail. Being naïve and enormously hungry, I assumed this was a figurative label, a fun nickname in reference to the Spanish passion for bulls. Three large chunks of meat in sauce were set before us. The first bite was SPECTACULAR! It was similar to pot roast in taste and texture; the meat simply fell off the bone. The, er, pieces of spine, actually. I quickly realized that bull’s tail is not simply a superfluous title. Although I truly enjoyed it, I must admit that after some time of pulling the muscle off the vertebrae my back and my stomach began to hurt.

As an avid olive-lover, I have been searching for the perfect olive in this olive-populated country. As of yet, I have not discovered a single olive that I like. I must emphasize, before coming to Spain, I had never met an olive that I DIDN’T love. The olives (and pickles) here tend to be flavored with anchovies and something I cannot place that is meant to be barbeque flavor. I tried many more in Sevilla, but I sadly admit that the olive quest continues.

We sampled what Craig declared as the best napolitanas Spain has to offer at La Compana, the café we haunted each morning for cafés con leche. Craig is particularly infatuated with these sweet pastries. They are similar to the French “pain chocolate” and are essentially a croissant-like pastry rolled around or injected with chocolate sauce.

We refreshed our palates with a good old-fashioned Budweiser when we wandered by a welcome sign that read: SEC Championship Alabama vs. Florida! The Texas Lone Star Bar, so it was proclaimed, welcomed us with open arms and we chatted with Florida fans and watched Spaniards eat cheeseburgers the size of dinner plates. It is a strange feeling, sitting in the south of Spain in a pub at three in the morning, listening to a mixture of languages buzzing around you and watching, of all things, American college football. Despite the fun of it, it was a sad night for Alabamians!

After two days of goat-cheese-stuffed-mushroom tapas, pan con tomate, sole with belle femme sauce, patatas ali-oli, fresh-squeezed orange juice, good coffee and wine, the straw that broke the camel’s back proved to be Adobo Sevillana, which, the waiter told us, is fried fish. Indeed. The entire fish, specifically, bones, skin, etc, cut in chunks, tossed in meal and fried. This was actually quite delicious, but difficult to eat if you don’t want to swallow the entire skeletal system. Thus, I only partook in only a partial portion. This is what saved me, I believe, from the bout of food poisoning-ish flu Craig woke up with the next morning. The paella and sangria were skipped as we instead sipped 7-Up and made our way back to the bus station for a lunch of potato chips and dried nuts.

All in all we did not run into many vegetables and the pork was still #1 on the menu every time. But it was refreshing to snack on seafood that isn't fried calamari rings or the octopus that is so beloved in Madrid. I can't wait to return south and continue my gastronomical exploration!

Holiday in Sevilla

Here in the Kingdom of Spain, December 8 was el Día de la Constitucíon, or Constitution Day, and December 10 was the celebration of the Inmaculada Concepción (the Feast of the Immaculate Conception). These two holidays are both special in their own right, and extraordinarily different. The contrasts are relatively obvious: namely, one is political and the other is religious.

Some form of the Day of the Constitution is celebrated in most countries across the globe. I believe this day holds special significance for each nation, depending on their history. In Spain, it seems to be particularly impacting due to their highly tumultuous history. In 1975 General Franco, the nation’s dictator, finally died. What followed was a difficult period of transition as his heir went about reforming the country. On December 8, 1978, the Spanish Constitution was finalized and approved.

A great population of Spanish citizens remembers the oppression of their dictatorship, and they truly value the constitution and all it stands for. I’m not so sure that’s the case in the rest of the nations in this world.

The Feast of the Immaculate Conception (reserved to honor the Virgin Mary’s sinless existence and the conception of Jesus Christ) is celebrated throughout many Catholic populations in the world. Besides Spain, it is celebrated in Argentina, Austria, Chile, Italy, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Peru, Portugal, Malta, and is recognized in many other nations.

But this blog is not intended to discuss the historical meaning and cultural impact of these holidays. It is meant to celebrate this fact: in the year 2008, these holidays straddled a Sunday, and I got a three day weekend.

Craig and I knew we wanted to take advantage of the break since we have had no time to travel thanks to our six-day-a-week schedule. Unfortunately this rigorous schedule left little time to plan our escape from Alcalá. This is how we ended up rushing to pack after class on Friday night, rushing to catch a train to Madrid, and rushing to board a bus to Sevilla.

Instead of sleeping like I should have been, I excitedly watched the thermometer at the head of the bus creep up from 5 degrees Celsius. Six degrees and six hours later, with plenty of time to catch the sunrise, we found ourselves walking along a foreign river, watching the youth emerge from bars and head home. Sevilla is beautiful. It is the Spain I have been missing! We allowed ourselves to act as tourists for the first time since arriving in this country, and it was fantastic. We waited in an hour long line to peruse the royal palace, sampled a few Sevillan specialties, took 230 photos, drank assorted types of sherry and freshly squeezed orange juice, ducked into the cathedral to gawk during mass, found a low-key flamenco show. Sevilla’s cardinal was in town to give mass and take part in the procession, so we got to see him close up and personally.

Unfortunately, it rained the entire weekend. Our feet stayed wet for days, and then Craig ended up sick with a stomach flu/food poisoning/some mysterious Sevillan tourist illness. But nothing could take away from the wonder of the weekend. It was AWESOME!


You think I'm kidding about taking 230 photos, don't you? I'm not. See my Picasa album for the goodies; the link is on the right.

More Weather Games

I have no proof, I have no pictures; I have only wet laundry and chilled toes; it snowed today. It did not stick to the ground, of course, but it was genuine snow, falling from the sky. In Spain. In Autumn.

I AM being mocked!

Thanksgiving, Expat Style

(Pictured here: Carlos, Isaac (our roommate), Ana, and Natalie.

(Pictured here: Blake, Lauren, and the Spanish Turkey.

As Thanksgiving is unfortunately not recognized as a work holiday in Spain, I had to work all day long on the 27th of November. So, we tackled a delayed dinner this weekend.

Craig and I discovered a store in Madrid called, no joke, "The American Store," where we were able to find (outrageously expensive) canned pumpkin pie filling and cranberry sauce (because, it just wouldn't be Thanksgiving without a bowl of canned cranberry sauce that nobody touches). At the Corte Ingles, a large department and grocery store chain here in Spain, we were able to find 4 dusty, unripe little sweet potatoes, some salted pecans, and, lo and behold, tucked in amongst the sheep brains and cow tongues, a turkey!

After the initial shock of paying 70 euro for the bird (granted, it WAS 19 lbs) we were faced with a slew obstacles: missing ingredients, oven malfunctions, a shortage of dishes, too-old yeast, a kitchen too cold for the bread dough to rise, conversion issues, a broken refrigerator, no storage space, no roasting pans, dull knives. Poor Craig was sent to the store no less than four times as our tiny, freezing kitchen was transformed into a laboratory of Thanksgiving experimentation. I wanted to make my family's traditional cornbread and sausage stuffing, but what to do without Jimmy Dean and Jiffy? We had our pie filling, but how to make pie without pie pans? What to do when your oven reads only 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 instead of degrees? Our Southern friend Lauren and I worked most of the day in the kitchen, checking the not-so-successfully-rising bread dough, greasing pans with butter and our fingertips instead of non-stick cooking spray, inventing new twists on our American family recipes.

We ended up with a spectacular feast that any American would be happy to partake in, particularly an American missing a holiday exclusive to our country—or their Spanish friends that want to try to understand the appeal of turkey and stuffing. We had a lovely, juicy turkey thanks to Lauren and Blake, the closest version of Momma’s stuffing I could fix, mashed potatoes (hand-squished with a fork by Craig), mushroom gravy, sweet potato casserole, fruit salad, yeast rolls, green bean casserole (brought by our American friend Natalie), cranberry sauce straight out of the can, my (pretty darn impressive) pumpkin pies, brownies (again, brought by Natalie via posted brownie mix straight from the states), lemon and chocolate cake homemade by our Spanish friend, Ana, lots of wine from our Spanish guests, and sweet tea!

It tasted like home.

To help us celebrate, we tried to watch American football. Unfortunately, we could not get the Alabama/Auburn game on the internet. This was especially sad because we actually had a graduate from each school here in our Spanish apartment! We were able to watch a few other games, though, and the SEC spirit ran hot through the piso. We did track the AL/AUB game online, and we are very pleased with the results. Roll Tide!


Happy Belated Thanksgiving to all, from Spain!

Autumn in Alcala

I’ve been here two months now, and it just so happens that these two months are two of the most meteorologically tumultuous and unpredictable of the year. The locals like to joke that there are only two seasons in Madrid: summer and winter. They’re not completely accurate however; there is indeed something of a transition period, a little like a menopausal sister season suffering from hot and cold flashes and a mean temper.

Maybe it’s because I’ve never lived anywhere that gets especially cold, but I cannot read this weather. It does not matter how frequently I check the reports or step out on the porch to gauge the temperature. I imagine that once we get settled into the cold winter, it will be a bit more regular. For now, however, it seems that if I wear boots and a scarf and a coat I will sweat on the way to the bus stop, but if I wear my coat over a t-shirt and heels, I will freeze. It seems that after I peer out my window in the mornings and note the women wearing tights and light jackets, they all run back inside and change into down coats and leather boots by the time I get down to the ground floor, simply to trick me into dressing inappropriately for the day.

The first week that Craig and I were here, it was very cold, perhaps 7 c in the evenings. Suddenly, the cold vanished and I wore tank tops around town; every day, we tried to enjoy the sun in case it slipped into hibernation. Since then, the temperature has risen and dropped several times and every time I think we’re easing into the cold, I am not entirely right.

Today, I dressed in slacks and a turtleneck, threw on a scarf and coat on my way out of my apartment. I was too warm as I rushed through town, power-walking to work, but when my classes ended and I reemerged, the wind had kicked up and it was bitterly cold. I thought, ah ha! At last, I have learned to anticipate! I made my way to a student’s home for a private lesson, and as we sat at the desk deciphering a family tree in English, I heard the rain begin. It was extraordinarily loud on the roof and when we finally pulled aside the curtains to look out the window, sure enough, marble sized hail was bouncing off the Spanish tile roof of the apartment complex across the street. All I could think was that all the laundry I washed yesterday, all my pants, my bed sheets, and my socks, were hanging on the line outside my apartment to dry, and that I was about to have to walk home in THAT with no umbrella.

Soon the ice reduced to rain, and when our time was up my student lent me a paragua, or umbrella. The moment I walked outside, however, as if Mother Nature noticed I was now carrying an umbrella, the rain ceased. The hems of my only clean and dry slacks were now dragging through muddy puddles as I stepped, but the sky cleared to an innocent periwinkle and arranged a sweet sunset in the distance. Clearly, I’m being mocked.

Parque del Retiro

The parks here are mostly small, tucked in between apartment complexes or business, perhaps boasting a shoebox sized play area for children or a modest fountain. Most at least have trees and benches; picnicking or lounging in the shade is a favorite hobby of the Spanish when the weather is nice. Some parks are particularly beautiful or well-maintained, some are more frequented by residents than others. The novelty for us is not in the beauty of the parks however, but in the sheer numbers. They are everywhere.



There is one park to top them all, though: the renowned Parque del Retiro in Madrid. This reserved area is enormous; it would take many days to walk all the winding paths through the trees or note every statue or visit every tiny café. It is the epitome of a Spanish Sunday afternoon, with its sidewalk performers and vendors, fortune tellers, magicians, jugglers; stunning sculptures, fountains, impressive gardens, and the lake dotted with rowboats. There are crowds of people—families or couples or artists or photographers—perhaps reading in the grass beneath a tree, working to capture the beauty on film or canvas, or simply walking the pathways, snacking on sunflower seeds or sweet popcorn. This time of year, the children are bundled up in their hats and gloves, happily cruising in their strollers or running ahead of their parents.



In 1632 the park was created for the royal family; it was not opened to the public until 1868. It sparks quite a beautiful feeling to walk the same pathways that millions and millions have walked before. I can't wait to see it in Spring!

These Boots Were Made For Walking

And it sure is a good thing. These Uggs are undoubtedly the most reliable shoes I have ever owned. They have seen the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. They have seen the snow of Lake Tahoe and the Wisconsin Dells. They have kept my chilly feet warm driving or flying cross country. They have walked the streets of San Francisco, of Los Angeles, of San Diego. They comforted my aching feet as I trained for my marathon. They’ve served as snow boots, rain boots, house shoes, walking shoes, hiking boots, fashion accessories, and have been through as much airport security as I have. They’ve lived in the California and Alabama, visited Canada, and now trekked through parts of Spain.

I walk a lot here. I walk to the academy; I walk across town to the grocery store and haul back groceries. I walk to the bus stop and the train station and the locations where I teach private lessons. I walk to lunch and dinner and walk miles through Madrid acting as a tourist. This is a walking city; unfortunately the red tile sidewalks, cobblestone streets, and cracked pathways often inhibit smooth travel—chinks in the grout trap heels, sloping curbs turn ankles and trip walkers, uneven surfaces force you to watch the ground as you step. To make it to the pharmaceutical company I work at, I hike across a dirt field and through the aging industrial center. Some days I can wear my trusty boots. Other times, my beat-up feet are clad in fake leather Payless shoes that look more professional for work, or more chic for restaurants. I fully intended to buy new, comfortable shoes when I arrived here, but there are several circumstances that stand in the way.

In the meantime, I continue to nurse what I have deemed “The Giant Blister that Would Not Die,” shown here. This is actually a blister atop a blister atop a blister, atop a blister. It does not pain me as much as one might imagine. I suffer more from the deep, bone-nerve-tendon foot pain I have been prone to for the past two years or so.

Unfortunately for me my Uggs have recently begun to show wear. Yes, they are a bit stained and scuffed on the outside, but, more importantly, the wool on the inside has slowly rubbed off. The fabric below that has worn holes. There are holes beneath my heels that go straight through the wool and the fabric AND the soft leather straight down to the rubber sole.

It doesn’t worry me too much. We have come this far together, and it will be a long time before I ever let them go.

Work

I do apologize for the lack of updates. Although I planned on working in Spain, I failed to factor in how much of my time I would have to dedicate to the task!

I like my job very much. Craig and I are both employed by the British House, a private English language academy here in Alcalá de Henares, which offers classes to every age and every level of learner. Ours is the leading English school in the area and we teachers are subsequently contracted to a number of jobs. So, we may work at more than one location if requested. For example, I hold a certain amount of hours at the institution itself, but I also travel to a nearby pharmaceutical manufacturer to teach private lessons to its big-wig employees that require business English education and conversation practice. So, I teach advanced adults at the academy and intermediate to advanced adults at Bayer. Additionally, I work as a private tutor. Craig is currently balancing academy hours with travel to the Spanish branch of Johnson and Johnson!

The downside to this sort of schedule is that the day grows long very quickly. Some days, one might have a single class. The next day, the work day can extend from 10 am to 9:30 in the evening. We must be very flexible for our students, especially when so many people wish to study after work or on the weekend. We are currently working 6 days a week and it is exhausting.

On the other hand, it is a stimulating job; if I was not working as an English teacher I would know nothing about Spain. I teach directors of a large business, teenagers, university students, a pilot, business administrators, accountants, biologists, chemists, pharmacists, translators, fathers, manual laborers, school teachers…the variety makes teaching extraordinary work, as my most important daily task is to encourage my students to speak in foreign tongue. This means I learn their opinions on political issues; I learn their cultural and familial traditions; I learn expressions and social habits. I learn about Spanish laws and history and geography. I learn about people, which is the very mission I undertook when deciding to travel in the first place.

Gastronomy 2: Fiesta

Craig and I were invited to a friend of a friend’s party and so, we actively attended a fiesta not knowing what to expect, where we did not know anybody, and, most importantly, could not speak the language. The small home was charming, with its grape arbor, bunches of raisins drying in the storage, a geranium-fringed tile porch, and the garden out back in autumn transition. It was on the outer edge of the city, and worked on a gasoline generator and non-potable water…but you would never know if someone didn’t warn you not to drink from the tap!

I was surprised when no one offered me a drink upon arrival. In the United States we use this as a social tool to take the awkward edge off party talk with strangers. Wine, for example, provides not only a conversation subject but also allows for brief pauses for thought as one swallows. But no one even gave a thought to drinks until the resident cook arrived and the food preparation began. Then, people began to break out the favorite cheap beer and mixers. A popular drink here is cerveza con límon, or beer with lemon Fanta. Most people were sipping on these and, although there were cases of liquor in the kitchen, those weren’t touched yet.

To me the most important and most interesting element of parties is and always will be the food. Unable to communicate without painful effort, I was especially drawn to the cooking, which requires no language. As with most cooking that takes place outdoors, the men were manning the ship, assembling a gigantic pan and propane burner set-up, dealing with the technical side of sticking cardboard beneath the stand to prevent wobbling. I was excited: I would be able to watch the preparation of and then sample the famous Spanish dish, homemade paella.

They heated oil in the pan and tossed in chicken pieces. I tried to count the bones; thigh chunk, ribs, wing joint. When it was mostly cooked they removed the chicken and replaced it with a mountain of very finely chopped onion and red and green bell pepper and sautéed them until the onion was translucent (just like my own momma always taught me). They added two jars of what I think was a very mild roasted tomato salsa. Slowly, the remaining ingredients were added: tightly closed clams, salt, strips of calamari, fish stock, green vegetable stock, ground saffron, three large sacks of rice, then ever so gently, langostinos, or prawns, their dark eyes glazed over, and one by one, mussels still in their wet shells.

In my experience thus far, it does not matter where in the world you are—men will always practice the same ritual while cooking outdoors. Be it a campfire, a propane stove, a barbeque, a pig in the ground, a turkey fryer, or a giant pot of jambalaya, the male chef will inevitably halt, assume a wide-legged stance, cross his arms, and stare into his meal for however long it takes for the satisfaction to set in. Craig and I came to the conclusion that this is genetically programmed into the male DNA, dating back to the dawn of humankind, when, in our hunter and gatherer societies, providing the tribe with food truly was a day’s work, or a week’s work, or more. Men truly fought for their meat and, as it slowly crackled over the first fires in our evolutionary history, they watched it with (hungry) satisfaction and pride.

In this case, we were all hypnotized by the bubbling concoction before us, by the smell of cooking food in the cold air, by the aesthetics of it, the yellow broth so bright against the dark black of the mussels, the warmth powerful in the weather. Our chef finally shook off his trance, realizing that more needed to be done. He lit a cigarette and distributed pages of newspaper to his onlookers and we each ceremoniously lay our sheet on top of the first, covering the pan to steam the contents. With the food covered, people wandered away, refilling their glasses, changing the music, making idle conversation. I found myself attracted to the baby in residence, the only other person besides Craig in linguistic isolation. Soon, plastic plates were handed out, loaves of crusty bread were set on various tables and finally—the newspaper was removed.


The dish was breathtaking. Bright yellow rice, seemingly decorated by the meats and shells, dressed with lemon slices. And the taste? Magnificent. What a beautiful balance between fluffy, tasty rice, and food you have to fight for—shrimp to peel, mussels and clams to pull from the shell, chicken meat to coax off the bone. I had to stop myself after two plates (though I felt like I could have eaten it all night long) and it left me with a content stomach and brightly dyed fingernails.



I give homemade paella five stars.

We caught a ride home with a man that had to put his baby to bed. We had been there five hours. “You’re going to miss the party,” our friend told us as we left, “It’s still early. La fiesta hasn’t started yet.”

Gastronomy 1: Restaurants

On one of our first nights here, Abbie remarked that the Spanish worship the pig. I replied that, generally, if a culture worships an animal, they refrain from consuming its meat at every meal. She laughed with a Spanish friend and replied that the pig is so upheld because of its importance in the Spanish diet. Indeed. I quickly learned that pig (this is what it is referred to, rather than ‘pork’) is included in essentially every meal.

Here in Alcalá, people will drink their morning coffee or tea and eat lightly, perhaps a toast with tomato and jamón (thin-sliced cured ham). Lunch is the biggest meal; it is taken around 2:00 in the afternoon. In restaurants, the standard lunch is two courses, perhaps a rice or pasta dish followed by a meat plate: sliced lomo (back meat) and sauce, albondigas (ground pork meatballs) and sauce, or another combination of pork. This is generally accompanied by fried potatoes and bread, a drink, and a dessert or coffee. People then take their siesta and return to work at 5:00, so dinner time does not roll around until 9 at the earliest. Dinner is meant to be light, thus the tapas tradition, which promotes bar-hopping to sample a wide array of what I can most easily explain as snacks. Occasionally, one might find a tapa constructed from smoked salmon or fried egg or canned tuna, but generally speaking, at least in Alcalá, tapas consist of lomo, jamón, chorizo, thick sliced salami, or another accented word that indicates pig, on a hard roll or toasted piece of baguette, sometimes with a bit of cheese. Sometimes one might find an option for calamari or pan tumaca (toast with a tomato-garlic-olive oil spread). As a salad and vegetable lover, I have struggled with this diet plan.

The important thing to realize is that when a pig is slaughtered in Spain, the entirety, minus perhaps the skeleton, is consumed; the ears, the stomach lining, the skin, the hooves, the blood, EVERY body part, can be found on a menu in this nation. It is a matter of pride! My approach is to give every dish a chance once. At the insistence of a local, in fact, Craig and I recently sampled black pudding. For this dish, meat is ground into sausage and pushed into intestinal lining, then injected with the drained blood of the animal, cooked, sliced, and squished into a pudding that is eaten on bread. It is, according to both my mind and my tongue, a giant, dark, thick scab. Yummy! A friend noted that the restaurant we tried this dish at does not prepare it wonderfully and that if we did not like it, we should really try it again at a different place. Right.

Dessert is, generally, a lunchtime luxury. Think custard and cream based cake or a caramel pudding like flan. Late at night, though, the chocolate appears. To a night-life adventurer, there is nothing better than a gofre, a waffle smeared with whatever topping you could imagine: chocolate sauce, whipped cream, strawberry jam, caramel, whatever combination thereof. Or perhaps you might prefer a napolitana, a pastry similar to a croissant rolled around a thick chocolate sauce. Or simply a chocolate croissant, a croissant sliced down the center, filled with chocolate, heated, and sprinkled with powdered sugar. Gofre shops are quite popular from, say, 3-5 am, when the night life is winding down on the weekends.

It’s a difficult schedule to adjust to. We, as Americans, are accustomed to small lunches and large dinners, for example. Here, Craig and I have had to learn to remember to eat lunch, to wait until 9:30 to head out for tapas, to expect a call at midnight or later to meet a friend, to expect everyone to show up much later than planned, to not question the ingredients of a dish set before us. I haven’t learned to love every cut of pork yet, to eat without peeling off strips of fat, to ignore dripping grease, to accept chunks of sausage as a meal. But I sure can appreciate and respect the whole consumption of a slaughtered animal, and I can understand the love and reliance on an animal that give itself up wholly to the nourishment of a nation.

The Cervantes Festival

Since Alcalá de Henares is the birthplace of Cervantes (and thus, some claim, the true birthplace of Spanish culture) it is not surprising that he and his work are celebrated throughout the city. Everywhere, there are bronze or iron or wooden Don Quixote characters and his recreated home is open for visitors. Childrens’ parks and tourist shops are dedicated to the characters in this most-famous work. Cervantes’ recreated home is open for viewing. And, every year on his October 9 birthday, the town shuts down to celebrate him, his work, and the period he lived in. This year Cervantes Day fell on a Thursday; every business throughout the city shut down and the Medieval Festival was erected and opened in the early morning.

The festival is a market, a gastronomical adventure, and a chance for Alcalá dwellers to bugger off work and drink a cheap bottle of cider. It’s crowded and fantastic, somehow beautiful and wretched at once, addicting and frustrating, like any festival across the world. Because the festival blocked our main path to work and markets and cafes, and because Craig and I liked it, we walked through it at least twice a day, pushed and pulled by the crowd and lured by the merchandise, and by the time it closed on Sunday we knew the booths thoroughly and often visited our favorites to pine (and be reminded of the thin state of our wallets!). There were tented palm readers, acrobats, musicians, made-up men on stilts, fire blowers, dancers, bird trainers with their troops of decorated eagles, owls, and hawks. There were potters, wood carvers, bakers, candle makers, ironsmiths, soap makers. There were burro rides and petting zoos, face painting, and beggars. There were vendors of all goods: shallow baskets of spices, burlaps sacks of healing herbs and teas; great molding, pungent wheels of cheeses, ropes of garlic and linked chorizo hanging from the wooden eaves of the booths, cured pig thighs and fat slabs of pork, baskets of salted sardines and vats of olives;


freshly fried potato chips, roasted corn, endless tables of cakes and pastries, homemade ciders and wines, freshly baked breads, cardboard cones of roasted chestnuts, dried fruits, and candy; aloe vera plants and products, potted herbs, dried bunches of lavender; freshly cut and aromatic chunks of soap, handmade candles, hand-dipped incense, carved and dyed and perfumed wooden roses;

jewelry made of stone and clay and metal and leather and shell and watermelon seeds; gemstones, bows and arrows, knives, wineskins, leather shoes and bags, medieval clothing, belly dancing costumes; kids’ toys, drums, bird whistles, balloons shaped like Spider-man and panda bear; Cervantes t-shirts, plates, and cards. There were restaurant booths with beer, wine, and tapas (appetizers, usually small sandwiches or crudités, that accompany a drink), plates of fried pig back fat, grilled ribs and chorizo, and every other cut and preparation of pig you could ever desire.

There were pulporias with their great copper vats of pink liquid and tentacles—the octopus is boiled then chopped into pieces and served with a sprinkling of paprika. There were booths for mojitos and pina coladas, crepes of all kinds, Arabic tents serving sweetened Tunisian tea. There was the smell of cooking pork and smoke in the air, complimented by the candles, soaps, perfumes, herbs, and the occasional stab of sewage.

It was very interesting and enjoyable! I would be lying though, if I said that I was upset when the vendors broke down their booths and disappeared. After four days of crowds, of late night yelling in the street, the smell of cooked pig clinging to my clothing, and the children—with their relentless drums and bird whistles and bows and arrows—I was glad for some quiet.
more pictures: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2124961&l=66f2e&id=6312129

Stork Sighting: Check!

I spotted my storks! They are awe-inspiring, somewhat terrifying, large, LARGE birds. The residents of Alcala aren't particularly fond of them for the "garbage" they produce, and the city has built support platforms for the nests (which are large enough to fit at least me, I'm fairly certain) to keep them from crashing down into the streets. Well, I like them!

I am a Teacher!

I taught my first class today at the British House. This particular class is very advanced. Today we discussed challenges in life: how births and deaths, weddings and divorces, illness or disease, living abroad, learning a new language, leaving for university, working stressful jobs, raising teenagers, etc, make us feel and how we deal with them emotionally. In Spanish, I can say, "Dos cafes con leche, por favor," and then ask for the check. Sometimes I think that's pretty gosh darn good. Today, one of my students said, while looking at a photo of a new mother in the hospital, "I think she is very glad because she is smiling. But also, the twins look like they may not be healthy, because they have tubes for oxygen. So maybe the mother is very scared that they will not live or they might be ill. And, she must also be feeling apprehensive about raising two children at the same time." How impressive! And yet, I feel that I was able to teach them some new vocabulary, etc. I also taught someone how to spell 'brief' properly! Not bad for my first hour and a half class!

Craig and I have both been assigned several hours a week by British House. They want Craig to teach the bulk of the advanced students since he has the technical side of the grammar down, and they want to eventually put me with children...which, although I'm not too excited about it, is the best way to utilize my own talents. I am actually also working as a private teacher for a 14 year old girl. I interviewed for the job this week, and I was hired to begin Monday. I am no longer scared of being able to find work, and I am much more confident about teaching. I think paying attention in class all my life is really paying off now!

This Place is Old, Man

We live in a very good location: we are two streets away from the Plaza de Cervantes, which is more or less the center of the historical district and of the part of town that concerns us. We are a three minute walk from our employer's office and several of our classrooms. We are close to a convenient grocery store and not far at all from the supermarket, several cafes, a few parks, and the river. Luckily for us we can walk where ever we might need to go. This area of Alcala is one of UNESCO's World Heritage Sites. Many of the streets are still cobblestone and the sidewalks are chipped brick. This limits traffic and pedestrians are encouraged by the sights. We live essentially next door to the University, which is still functioning despite its reputation as one of the oldest in Europe. She is over 500 years old!! (Pretty impressive to me...my own university was built in 1917 and has yet to survive Roman conquest or civil war). We are also surrounded by massive footprints of Catholicism, gargantuan (working) convents, hermitages, and incredible cathedrals, including the one in the Plaza de Santos Ninos, built to honor children that were martyred for their families' beliefs in (according to what I was told) the 400s. On the rooftops of these aging buildings, especially those with towers overlooking the city, one can see the nests of storks. I am told I will be able to hear their bill clattering communication during mating season. I am determined to spot a stork and have not even come close in succeeding.

Alcala de Henares is the birth place of Cervantes, the Spanish writer who produced Don Quixote. Here, you can visit a recreation of the Cervantes home and the city celebrates this celebrity with vigor. Every place you go, you see Cervantes and Don Quixote, in bronze statues, on the coins, in the shop windows, and of course, in the Plaza de Cervantes, where Cervantes stands tall, overlooking the square, quill poised to record what he sees.

The View from the Kitchen Window

Our apartment is quite nice for the price. We viewed several "pisos" and finally decided, rather than spend the 700 euros (plus 700 euro deposit) for privacy (and self-maintained cleanliness), we would rent space in a four bedroom, two bathroom apartment. We are in a very central location and have wireless internet (which we use nonstop), a TV (which we never use), and heat for the winter months. As you can see in this picture, we have a laundry room as well...or a strung wire outside the kitchen window. We are equipped with a washer (thank goodness) but do have to air dry our clothes, something that I couldn't have imagined I would mind. Of course, when I think of line-drying clothing or sheets or towels, I picture it like anyone else from my technological generation would...overlooking a soft field in a golden breeze and fresh, mountain air. Or something. As it is, we'll now wear our jeans 3 or 4 or 5 days without washing them, since when you hang them out the kitchen window they pick up every aroma (of trash, the neighbor's frying fish, the traffic smog, the mold from the shaded walls). We don't get any sunshine on our side of the building, so they take a day and a half to dry and are long crunchy boards when we pull them back in.

I make it out to be worse than it is, but please do believe me, things don't smell very good here.

But back to the apartment. We have a small kitchen with a fridge and a freezer, a tiny porch with a bit of sun and a view of the busy street and a square the children play in after siesta. We have a microwave and an oven that we can't figure out how to work.

Most importantly, we have good roommates. One, as I mentioned before, is from the United States. Blake is an English MFA student, so we have a lot in common with him, and with his girlfriend as well, who is also a Georgian. Blake is fluent in Spanish (when he is not speaking English with a strong southern accent) so he helps us to communicate with Jorge and Isaac. Jorge is a hermetic local and speaks no English (we don't see much of him), but Isaac is a student from Barcelona. He is learning English, so we practice our foreign languages on one another. We watched the futbol game with him the other night, then he watched the Georgia-Alabama football game with us. All in all, everyone is friendly but mostly busy and out of the apartment.

I'm very content living here. There are a lot of strange sounds to adjust to (and strange hairs in the bathroom) but it is SPAIN!

As Fate Would Have It...

Of all the apartments and all the people in Spain, the place we ended up living happens to have an American roommate. Blake, it turns out, is from Georgia, a fact we established when we first met. We joked about trying to find the American football games at a bar but, since the Alabama Georgia game started at 2 AM our time and, well, it's Spain, I didn't give it too much thought. Who would have thought that last night I would be sitting on the couch in my Spanish apartment, watching pay per view computer feed of Alabama CREAMING Georgia? (For those of you who did not watch or do not know, Alabama is currently undefeated and has now beat one of the strongest, highly rated college teams). Woo! ROLL TIDE!!

Angel of Alcala

Thank God for Abbie. She fetched us from the airport, put us up at her apartment for a few days, contacted her old boss on our behalf and got us jobs, served as a translator for us as we searched for our own place and purchased cell phones, showed us the basic geography of Alcala, introduced us to her favorite Spanish foods, and, most importantly, introduced us to several English speaking Spanish friends who are permanent residents of this city and will be here to offer advice as we go. Thanks to her, we now have a small network of contacts including the owner of a leasing agency and real estate company, a nurse, the head of a teaching agency, a bartender, a friend with a car, a homeowner in Barcelona, and several English teachers. Thanks to her, British House (an agency that contracts out teachers to businesses and academies in needs of English lessons) is finding us jobs, we have a few clients lined up for private lessons, we can find our apartment (and ask for directions if we get lost), we have signed a lease on a small room in an apartment (with a roommate from GEORGIA, USA!), we know how to make a basic dinner order, and we have phone numbers to distribute to potential clients. Muchas gracias to Abbie!

The Arrival

What a beautiful bundle of stresses. Craig and I made it through security in Atlanta and through a two hour layover in Toronto, onto a very very hot plane and into the city of Madrid. We thankfully (and sweatily) stepped off the plane and, upon reaching the smoky baggage claim, found that one of Craig's bags was happily riding the carousel. We waited for the rest of our luggage to appear. And waited. Waited. WAITED. My tired mind struggled to remember what was in each bag. We could always buy more clothes, more books, wash our flight undies in a bathroom and hang them to dry. The longer we stood, watching bags pass by that looked like ours but were not, the more I turned to resignation. So I would not have my very soft pajamas or my plug adapters. If I could just get some sleep, I would survive. I could deal with it later. The fatigue from the flight was such that when the bags finally showed up, one by one, twenty or thirty minutes later than the first, there was no celebration.

Craig has a friend that has been living in Spain for a few years. She happened to be in Madrid and had planned on meeting us at the airport and helping us out for a few days before she headed back to the states. We gathered our luggage and hauled two suitcases each through customs, then…no Abbie. We searched the arrivals salo. No Abbie. We exchanged cash and made a payphone call, but Abbie’s phone was unreachable. We searched more. No Abbie. I, in my state of ultimate calm resignation, sat on my suitcase and filed my nails, my exhaustion allowing no worry, as Craig jogged through the crowds. Finally we decided to drag our suitcases along with us and simply walk the airport in hope that she was lost. It is a small airport, and we quickly found Abbie…at a separate arrivals salo.

It was onto the bus directly, surrounded by bags and people giving us dirty looks. And in a puff of dark exhaust, we left Madrid. We climbed off that bus and found ourselves in a construction site where, rather than walking across the street we were forced to tow our bags up one ramp…then another, then another. Then down, and up another and onto a second bus. We pushed our bags into the storage compartment of another, larger bus, and found seats on the way to Alcala. When we reached our stop, no more than twenty minutes later, Abbie crawled into the storage hold to retrieve our apparently slippity-slidey suitcases. My over stimulated and exhausted brain, wandered, once again, to the possibilities. What would I do now, if the bus pulled away with Abbie sprawled out on her belly in the belly of a bus? I vaguely thought that although I did not know how to explain to a driver what was going on, I could probably wave my arms and shout, which would be enough. Luckily, the driver was watching us in the mirror and waited patiently for us to close the doors and step away.

Abbie, all smiles, led us down narrow, seemingly endless streets, our luggage noisily clattering over the cobblestone behind us. Across town, up a flight of stairs, into, finally, a shower, a meal, and a bed.

This was our introduction to Spain.

Pushing Through the Last Minute Packing Rush

At this moment I am still in the United States, preparing for the trip across the Atlantic. This is Monday; Craig and I depart from Atlanta tomorrow at 5:30 PM central time via Air Canada. We have a two hour layover in Toronto and will arrive in Madrid at 11:30 AM central European time. I will update soon after we reach our destination: Alcalá de Henares.