Bittersweet

A few days ago, I walked into my bedroom at my parents' house, only to find a fluffy cat sleeping upon my pillow. The cat, named Lily, initially belonged to my sister, but she began to reside in East Wenatchee when my sister moved in with her boyfriend a few years ago. Back to the point, Lily had never chosen to sleep on my pillow. I'd almost never even seen her enter my room. She roams the rest of the house like a queen in her kingdom, jumping on the table or the kitchen counter whenever she pleases (much to the displeasure of my mother), but my bedroom has mysteriously remained outside of her domain. So, I might add, have I. Not because I dislike her, or because I dislike cats; I rather like cats, and cats rather like me. But, no matter how diligently I tried to earn her affection, it was always fruitless.

Ever since I arrived in June, I would regularly pet her, pick her up, meow at her, or just generally try to interact with her. When I attempted to pet her, she would walk away. Pick her up? She squeakily meowed like there was no tomorrow, until I released her. Meow at her? (This usually works with other cats.) She would wander away, unamused.

But, somehow, after two and a half months, I have gained Lily's trust. I can only assume that my diligence has paid off. And now I am leaving. Will she remember me in a few months? What about in a year? Was all of my effort for nothing, only to enjoy Lily's affection for the next two weeks until I return to a faraway land? It was worth it, I think.

... I think.

this is awesome

June Wanderings

I woke up on June 4 in a sleepy daze, the kind that comes after a night of much too little sleep, and glanced at my cell phone. It felt a little warm in the room, evidence that the sun had risen more than expected for my 7:30am wake-up time, but I wasn't too worried as I glanced at the clock on my cell phone. And then, suddenly, I was worried. It was 9:20am. I was going to miss my bus to the airport! Well, more specifically, I was going to miss the first of two (both necessary) buses that would transport me to the airport before my flight to Bilbao. After breathing heavily and frantically considering all of my options for a few minutes, I hurriedly packed all of my things and ran out the door to the bus station. I had certainly already missed my bus, but there was a chance, just a chance, that another bus would be driving the same route, even though it wasn't posted.

I arrived at the station and explained my situation to the lady at the counter. She looked skeptically at me, but found (to my incredible delight!) a bus that would take me to Marbella, where I could catch my second bus to the airport. Thus, my travels around the Iberian Peninsula began.



























(1)Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain
(2)Door on Juan de Bilbao Street, San Sebastian, Basque Country, Spain
(3)La Concha Bay, San Sebastian, Spain
(4)Oviedo Cathedral, Spain
(5)Bagpipes, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
(6)Botafumeiro, Santiago de Compostela Cathedral, Spain
(7)Santiago de Compostela, Spain
(8, 9, 10)Porto, Portugal
(11)Alfama District, Lisbon, Portugal
(12)Lisbon, Portugal
(13)Sintra, Portugal

Dwindling Skills

I've been back in the USA for a week and I've already forgotten how to convert Fahrenheit to Celsius. If I think about it for a few minutes, I can make a rough conversion, but I used to be able to do so in a matter of seconds. The fact that it's only taken me a week to forget a skill I used regularly in Spain worries me about my beloved Spanish language skills.. now begins my effort to maintain a skill that I will use rarely for the next few months.

Trying to explain my opinion of American culture last night, I realized I had forgotten the word hegemony. At university (the British way of saying college; a part of the weird mixture of American/British English I currently utilize), I encountered this word almost daily. It was a buzzword. I learned it as a freshman and used it in nearly every International Studies essay thereafter. But, all of a sudden, I graduated from university and it disappeared from my life. A few minutes later in the conversation last night, I had the same problem with genetic.

I haven't thought about the concept of hegemony itself in a good few months. (I definitely have considered genetics recently, so that was more of a fluke.) Instead, I spend my time figuring out that you can use the same word in Spanish to describe pouring something in a cup, throwing someone out of your house, and putting on sunscreen (echar), that queso de untar is cream cheese, that cacharro is carnival ride, or that conjunctivitis how you say pinkeye in both Spanish and British English.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. I'll probably never forget hegemony again, nor genetic, but I'll certainly forget other pretentious intellectual words that I don't utilize nearly as often in Spain. I must keep up with my reading of the New York Times, etc. After all, that is what my International Studies degree taught me to do...

Sometimes...

Sometimes bees confuse my head with flowers. It is always frightening.

Sometimes I feel like I have a different personality in Spanish, because my tone of voice is different, and I express myself in different ways (far less adequately than in English).

Sometimes I question my reasons for traveling. 'To experience other cultures and learn new languages' sounds super legit and is essentially the realization of my university studies, but just because something sounds rational doesn't mean that it's true.

Sometimes I have trouble separating what I tell myself my reasons should be for doing various things, and what my reasons really are. But then I wonder, is there really a difference between those two things? Can't I decide the way to live my reality, and create my own 'reasons' for doing things? What does 'true' actually mean?

Basically, I want to remain in Spain next year. I applied to my program, was accepted, but I don't know where I'll be placed. It will definitely be within Andalucía, but it might be another province. My most rational reason for staying is because I have a job here, and I think that job is pretty nice. My second most rational reason is to better my Spanish, because it's improving, but it could get a lot better.

Sometimes I worry that I will make a relatively permanent decision, one that's hard to back out of, and then I'll completely change my mind. What if I don't want to be in Spain by next November? But, the exact same thing could happen in the USA, in Seattle, in Wenatchee. So, for now, I will do this.

And by 'this' I mean show you pictures of pretty flowers and kittens.

Semana Santa

I had been waiting for the Semana Santa procession for hours. Tired, cold, and with any desire to see the procession waning, I could finally hear it coming. The sound of the snare drum was unmistakable. The people crowded in the street started to organize themselves. I squeezed myself into an open space near a flowerbed and held my ground. Judging by the proximity of the snare drum, I decided the procession would arrive in a few minutes, Jesus would meander by on a pedestal along with some people in pointy white hats, and the whole ordeal would be over within half an hour. I didn't know very much about Semana Santa processions.

It was my fault I had been waiting for so long. I left my apartment early, just to make sure I didn't miss anything, but going anywhere early is a bad idea in Spain. Thus, realizing the procession wouldn't arrive, let alone begin at all for at least 3 hours, I resigned to reading my novel under the setting sun, and then getting coffee and reading my novel some more. That killed 2 hours, so I decided to spend the last hour chatting with friends at a known hang-out spot. Perfect, I had passed my 3 hours with ease, and set off to find my Wednesday evening Holy Week procession around 10:30pm.

But, parting with my Spanish friends was difficult because, being male, they were hesitant to let me wander off alone into the night to track down the parade of white pointy hats. But, they were also completely uninterested in seeing the procession themselves, having been inundated with it enough times as children. They seemed to think that I should skip the procession and any religious celebration of Semana Santa, and continue hanging out with them. I told them I wasn't coming to Spain and missing a bunch of people carrying Jesus down the street on their shoulders, so we settled with them accompanying me halfway to the procession, and then agreeing to meet up later.

Eventually, the procession arrived. The policeman told me it would arrive at 10:30, but it didn't reach me until 11:15. That was to be expected. I watched intently as the rows of white hats paraded down the street.


Being American, I attach an entirely different meaning to those white hats, with their eerie faceless masks, uniform robes, and tiny eye slits. But, after the initial shock, I tried to push that image out of my thoughts.

The procession continued, with clumps of children in between the rows of pointy hats, adding comic relief and amusement. Being children, the pushed each other, dropped the 'important' religious objects they were carrying, and were generally merry. The merriment was apparent because they didn't have masks - the masked adults may have been merry, but who could tell behind the menacing pointy hats? (Clearly, I couldn't completely banish the KKK image from my mind.)


Next, and to my surprise, came women in all black, with painfully high heels and lace draped over their hair. I'm still not sure of their purpose, but the black seemed like mourning.


And finally! Jesus arrived! Carried on the shoulders of penitent Catholics, he moved by at a snail's pace, and everyone around me stood and clapped. The standing, I surmise, was in respect for Jesus, and the clapping was for the faithful carriers. (Click here to see a video.)



Jesus was followed by a band. It was now midnight, and thus, I decided that the procession must be over. I was blocked in by people, so I waited for them to part to make my exit. They didn't part. They didn't move at all, in fact. To my dismay, the procession was not over. Not even close. Still to come was the Virgin Mary, surrounded by many more pointy hats, women in black, children, and another band. I only stayed long enough to catch a glimpse of the mourning Mary and then escaped through cracks in the crowd.


Now half past midnight, I ventured off to join the non-religious Semana Santa celebrations, much like Spring Break celebrations in the States.