BURGOS

Last week we took a school trip to Burgos, about 2.5 hours from homebase. I think I actually learned a lot on this trip! But too lazy to detail, so I'll just post some pictures with captions. WHooopy!

Catedral de Burgos, a stop on the Camino de Santiago and a reason  Burgos is a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Ceiling of the sacristy in Roccoco style. Our guide was fun and made sure we learned plenty of new Spanish vocab words

Maqueta, model, of the Catedral. It's a seemingly endless place.

Abuelitos!

Statues.

Kelsey and I decided the orange roofs make Burgos look "Spanish".

We decided to visit the castle and well, unbeknownst to us the tour included going into the tunnels surrounding the well where there were boobie traps over 700 years ago.

La Catedral de nuevo, con mejor tiempo, better weather

El Cid Campeador. We read his tale (in English don't be impressed) last year in a Spanish lit class. He is buried inside the cathedral. 

Me cago en la leche!

For me, today is about as frustrating as a day can get in my current situation. Meaning, keeping in mind the perspective that I am still living the dream in San Sebastián, it isn't such a bad day. But compared to other moments here, I'm just ready to say "aaaargh!"

I had 4 English classes again, my last ones in fact, but perhaps due to the heat I was beat after just 2. Anyways, then I headed to my host fam's for lunch. I asked last week if I could come since I was on a tight sched and the 1st school is right near their house. However, I am out of minutes so I sent Kelsey a msg to double check that it was ok this morning. I rang twice and nobody answered, and I didn't wanna be a pest so I just left. As I was leaving I was a tinge sad to be forgotten about, but I also thought "but...but what if she made me lentejas?" Anyways, I got over that ~pain~ by eatting half of a frozen pizza. Far from home-cooking, but oh well. After the last class I was supposed to meet my friend at the spa to get some "relax" in. Unfortunately she was unable to make it and we were then going to hang on the beach since I already had my swimsuit with me. Walking the length of the beach in long pants, I finally made it to the bathroom/changing areas only to find out you apparently have to pay for that luxury. Frustrated, hot, and tired I just went home. Bahh! Such nice weather and I wasted a siesta indoors.

Anyways, that was only minor frustration, no pasa nada. When it really started to pain me was when I saw the notice that my favorite Spanish band, and truthfully favorite band that currently plays period, is going on tour. In September. Of course, I will not be here during that time. Out of all the months I've been here, they couldn't have decided to go on tour?! Seriously! Estuve pero rabiosa!! WHYYYYYY!?!?! On second thought, at least it is a while after I'm gone and not like a few weeks. If that were the case you can bet I would be in a hurry to change my ticket's departure date jejeje. But really...I just can't even deal with the harsh reality at this moment! Buaaaaa.

Then, la gota que colmó el vaso: I found out my host madre did indeed make lentejas. Just for me, since she doesn't even like them but knows I do. GOSH DARN THIS DAY. Pedazo de mierda, de verdad! Es que...Kelsey left a message that said I might have to wait 10 mins bc madre was going to the store at 1, but obviously I didn't get it til after the fact. I MISSED THE LENTEJAS! Buuu. On the plus side, I will be going for leftovers tomorrow. :D

And honestly, I realize that all this complaining is illegitimate bc I'm in Spain! It is always a fabulous day here! I haven't posted in a while bc I've been busy. There have been moments when I remembered how extra lucky I am, but you just won't get to read thos. :P Oh, other pain of the day is tomorrow I have 2 papers due: 20 pages on Basque Carnivales and 6 on Buñuel. Nearly finished, so it's a huge relief to me.

Today was a swell day. The weather was de maravilla, the students I worked with were well-behaved, everything was splendid. Yes today was an English teaching day, in fact I had 4 classes rather than the usual 1. The first 3 were at an Ikastola, meaning the classes are taught in Basque. Aw yeah, how exciting! There were even international students--one each from China, Ecuador, and England. That impressed me because these kids came here perhaps not even knowing Spanish (ok, obviously the ecuatoriano did), and now they are taking classes in Euskera, Spanish, and English. Quite amazing! Actually, the British student knows Spanish and Basque for class, and speaks English and Welsh at home. Welsh and Basque! An incredible linguistic combination, really. In addition to these pleasant classes, my regular class that tends to be disinterested in anything I say (it's age-appropriate I guess) seemed more attentive than usual. Jeez, 4 classes is almost like being a real teacher. Haha, almost. To wrap up a tiring day, I took a nap on the beach. C'est ma vie!

Yesterday and Monday were free days thanks to the puente. Since Tuesday was Labor Day, in Spain the Monday is automatically also a holiday. Word on the street is Rajoy (current president) wants to change it. I'd like to see him try, as these folks are loco for puentes! :D I went to Ireland for a few days (post to follow) and yesterday went to the local cemetary. Morbid? Perhaps. There is only one in San Sebastian, so I wanted to investigate. Well, in case you were curious as to differences between a Spanish and American cemetary, there are no grassy pastures in this one. Just rows of ornate tombstones, dedicated to entire families rather than couples. Many of them say "Property of Don Jose Fulano" (example) and then list all of the relatives buried there. I saw one with the oldest having died in the 1890s and then the most recent in the 2000s. A lot of family history in one hole eh.

Semana Santa II: Praha, in the Old Country

Sunday afternoon we arrived in Prague. The mother country! Hooray! The architecture is a delight, just as I hoped. Most of the people do speak English, which is lucky because Czech is for me hard to grasp since it isn't a Romance language. We picked a good time to come-- despite the cold, at least it didn't rain much and the Easter markets were open.

Day 1
Our first meal was in a pretty authentic restaurant. It had tables separated, but all in a long row, and there were a good amount of families there probably celebrating the holiday together. At first I ordered just 3 dumplings, and Autumn did the same. They gave us a weird look. In my family, dumplings are fist-sized balls of dough. In Prague though, they are the size of baguette slices. Can't make a meal out of that! So I ordered it as a side dish for schnitzel, yumm. We also did some money exchanging this day. Czech korunas are at a very different rate than USD, euros, or British pounds, which are all relatively equivalent. I believe 100 euros was worth about 2200 korunas. We're rich!! Not really, bc according to our guide, 200 korunas buys a lunch and beer. For dinner we had kielbasa from a nearby Easter market. Comes with complimentary rye bread. :) Oh, I bought myself a decorated egg. It's life with me would be short: I wore it around my neck for safekeeping, and then leaned against the Charles Bridge. Oops. :\ Our first night we were quite tired, but didn't get much sleep being in an 8-person room with a mad snorer. It happens.

Day 2
We decided to take a Free Tour which was in fact, an excellent decision. We not only saw a lot of the city to get an idea of places to go, we also learned a lot of history. The 20th century was not a very joyous time in Prague. We strolled the Charles Bridge, where we were treated to their jazzy Bridge band, and did some souvenir shopping. We also saw the Infant of Prague, the inside of the church is very elaborate. Strudl was definitely eaten today, can't remember what else. At night, as per recommendation by our guide, Autumn and I went to see a musical performance. It was a string quintet that played a variety of classical pieces. Quite pleasant, and apparently the thing to do in Praga. In our hostel we had a 4 bed room, because that night our friends Diana and Meghan arrived. It was like our own hotel room, dobre!

Day 3

We repeated some of the attractions, now that our other travel companions were in tow. There was light rain while on the Charles Bridge, which made for some cute umbrella pics. Luckily, my strawberry umbrella is just precious. :P Lunch was at an Easter market, and I had what I dub the Czech pizza: fried bread, topped with shredded cheese and ketchup. And the kind sir gave me 2 for 1 since he claimed they were small. Yum! :) Later on in the day, we took another tour, this time in the Castle area of Prague. It's up a bit of a hill, and not only is there the castle but some churches and just another neighborhood essentially. We saw a changing of the guard ceremony, and stood in a place designed so that apparently you hear your voice extra loud or something. (Not sure, it didn't seem to work for me) After the tour they recommended a Monastery with national award-winning beer. Since the Czech Republic consumes the most beer annually, this honor seemed pretty legit. I tried the special Easter Beer, which did magically taste more springlike than the other brews I've had. Afterwards we strolled down Nerudovny Street. Here's a fun fact: Pablo Neruda got his name from a Czech author named Jan Neruda. 

Day 4
We all had lunch at a place with a new friend from the hostel. The tables here have their own beer spout or whatever it's called. On top of that, there is a screen on the wall which says which table has drunk the most beer so far. Clever marketing strategy, eh! The table near us had over 7 tallies (and 10 people, mind you), whereas we had 2. Woopie! Today was nice because we got to split up differently (9 days travelling together...everyone gets a bit annoyed heh). Diana and I went to the lock bridge, where couples put a lock around the rails to represent their undying love. Even I find it sweet! :) We also saw the Lennon grafiti wall, where the day before unbeknownst to us, Autumn had left her little mark within the heart. Other Prague classics we saw were the freaky baby sculptures, and an odd shaped building featured on postcards.

Day 5

Last day in the old country. Autumn and I had a few things on our final to do list for Prague, one of them being walking up a hill to a giant metronome, which represents the Czech people moving forward after communism (if I remember correctly), and also provides a nice view. Bueno, for the first time on the trip the rain really got in the way. My darling Converse have holes in the bottom near the heels, which is not conducive to rain. Being the former girl scout as I am, I was resourceful and put plastic bags around them. Sure, people stared at my fashion choice, but it served me well for maybe 15 minutes. Then I was just carrying around bags of water around my ankles  haha. We scaled the stairs, took in the view for a few minutes, and were then already wet and decided to go back to the hostel to dry off and remain that way until our flight. Waiting in the airport for our flight, there were some people speaking Basque. Although I didn't understand, I sure recognized it, and felt relief. We were almost home. :)

Kerryoke

If nothing else, I feel accomplished after last night. It was a lot of fun, but I wouldn't go so far as to call it "crazy fun." :P

First, I went with Kelsey to Pan Jueves, a little gathering of foods held by her group of friends every Thursday. Afterwards to celebrate some fellow American's bday, we went to karaoke. It was drizzling, and we almost didn't find the place, but finally reached it with success. In total there were 5 Spanish people our own age, 2 older Spanish women, and a dozen Americans from my program. Weird, I have never hung out with so many Americans at once this semester. The song selection was mostly "classsic" Spanish pop, with only 5 English songs. Unfortunately, I am not well-versed in Spanish pop, rock yes, but not pop. BUT ALAS: there was one 80s tune I knew quite well, translated as "Forget me and hit the road." Ah, yes, it's a duet between a man and a woman. So logically I asked one of the fellas in the group of Basques to sing along with me. It was awesome. Maybe it wasn't even that great, but in my head it was fantastic cos there I was on stage singing with passion in Spanish, and gesturing appropriately to the lyrics, with this guy I've never met before. Classic.

Here's the song.

Un finde fantástico

We interupt your Spring Break broadcast to recap this weekend, since it's fresher in my memory and was just splendid. My mom, aunt, and uncle came for a visit, which was sweet although confusing at the same time...family from home but I'm in Spain...hard to wrap your head around.

They got here Friday afternoon, and the weather really was not cooperating. It was rainy, but stopped just long enough for us to start walking to their  Pensión...five minutes later we were caught in the pouring rain. Gee whiz! So Friday was mostly a travel day for them, but we took a little walk around the town and had Kebab for dinner/lunch. It was early even by American dinner hour standards, but filling enough so that a Spanish hour dinner was not required. My aunt got me some cool purple shoes as a fashionable bday present.

At night I went to a concert with my bro and it was a great time. Berri Txarrak, my favorite current Basque band. Well...technically it's the only band I know that sings all in Basque. Of course I didn't know the lyrics, but I recognized some of the melodies at least. Also, I would like to note beforehand the lead singer was outside a bar approximately 10 feet from us, but we were too shy to ask for a photo I guess haha.The venue was bigger than a bar, but small enough to be personal. And it was packed with Basque youth. YEAH! Afterwards, I had the post-rock-concert-partial-deafness as we headed to a hamburguesería for a late night snack. Oso ongi!

Saturday my family went to Lourdes, France, so I  got some stuff taken care of around here blah blah blah. At night though, we all went to eat at a pretty fancy restaurant, where one of my Spanish Club friend's dad is the chef/owner. I ordered txipirones en su tinta, squid in its own ink. Classic Donostiarra, right there! Sometimes I forget that not all of my fam understands Spanish. Because the waitress/chef would talk to us and I would respond without thinking of translating to English. But anyways.

Yesterday was the summation of their visit--lunch at my host family's house. Man, I was looking forward to that for a while, and it was as grand as I had hoped! :D We went over around 11, my mom, aunt, host madre, Kelsey, and I went to the kitchen to commence preparations. My uncle and host padre took a walk, despite the crummy weather. It was so pleasant, all of us cooking together and gesturing or translating. At the end of 2.5 hours of prep, there were 2 chickens with stuffing, dumplings, jamón serrano, salad, tomatos, and of course pan. ñaaaaaaaaaam! In all, there were 9 of us at the table, chatting in Spanish, English, and a mix. Pero qué divesión! I was really happy to have both my families together at once, minus my daddyo unfortunately. We were allowed a post-lunch siesta, and then the 6 of us went on a walk of San Sebastián. We saw a good part of town, and even stopped for churros y chocolate. Then near the beach the Spaniards bid farewell to the Americans, and later that night I said goodbye to my family. By now they are in Barcelona. It was a short but pleasant visit, I do declare.