Travel, Thanks, Turkey - Time is a flyin'

Every day is becoming more full. more routine. and unfortunately, colder. We had our first rain since my grand entrance, and the nights get wickedly cold. Couple that with an empty gas 'bombona' and you are taking ice cold showers in ice cold weather. The result: numb toes, lots of tea and a down sleeping bag. But the days are warmer, and the sky feels tremendous when it has a thick cloud cover.

The past two weekends I have traveled. Last weekend to Sevilla, for my first time, and I returned today from Jerez. Sevilla is the capital of the region, about 2,5 hours from Ronda and it is just majestic. It has wide avenues with new metro trams, right next to old cathedrals, and a beautiful Arabic fortress, the Alcazar in the middle of the city. I went with Saskia, and we stayed with a couple belgium girls that had come and visited us the weekend before. It was a whole different world from little Ronda, and a very beautiful city. After the complicit tourist sights, we hit the streets and literally shopped till we dropped. There was a moment that evening when we were frolicking in the narrow cobblestoned streets and we said, "Estamos en Espana!!" and I said, "Estamos en Eurpoa!" and being the only nonEU citizen, they said 'but we are always in europe." and two had enevr been outside of europe. a very different experience for me.. as someone who as traveld a good deal throughout europe.. and yes I can certainly distiguish and appreciate the diversity of culture between borders, but it was also eye opening, to realize how much of a different perspective I bring to Spain that someone who comes from another European country. And I felt very grateful to have had the opportunity to travel and be exposed to so many different environments. The weekend ended at a Sunday market on the edge of town. It was a wonderfull flea market feel, with many immigrants and an eclectic cultural mix that made me feel like for a moment I was in Latin America.. a continent that I think of often, and still miss during my time in spain. Nothing here has come close to the natural vibrancy of life in Latin America. And although a bit peculiar - there is nothing like directly facing and experiencing a social injustice like extreme poverty to rile me up and feel impassioned to make change. Although I love teaching.. there is something tremendously fulfilling about even writing a report on international development or microfinance.

That Thursday was Thanksgiving. Known as Dia de Accion de Gracias here. People knew impressively little about the holiday, and so it was enjoyable to share it with all of my students. It was a week FULL of drawing hand turkeys, learning beak, wing, feather, singing the Turkey Dinner Song (hand movements a must) and for the advanced groups writing Thanksgiving acostic poems about what we are thankful for. I explained what stuffing is, gravy, pumpkin pie, the Thanksgiving Classic, Macy´s Day Parade, Black Friday, homesick, the Pilgrims.. todo. I must have sung that Turkey Dinner Song at LEAST 78 times. Then it came time for my own Turkey Day celebration, and thanks to (no pun intended) technology I got to see my whole family via Skype. Jen and I had an unconventionally lovely Thanksgiving dinner at around 10:30 pm when we got off work. It included Chicken, french fries, spanish wine, Flamenco Dresses and candlelite. Hermosa.

The next day Jen I am were off to Jerez de la Frontera- a town of about 200,000 people, where we met up with 2 other girls from Georgia that were doing the same program. One of them works in Jerez, and so we all stayed with her (economical - ya know?). We arrived in the rain, a little biased that our city is the absolute best, but the city and weekend proved to be splendid. I found it to be authentic, typical piece of Spain in a way more polished tourist cities aren´t. Lots of churches, old narrow windy streets, grandiose fountains. But what Jerez is also known for is horses and Wineries. Jerez means Sherry. So after the most non-mexican food I have ever had (i´ve never considered myself a food snob, but SuperRica would have found it comical) - the next day we went to a winery. Although the tour was sold out, we took pictures and enjoyed the senery. We saw some horses, and then decided to go to a cafe and have our own Sherry taste test. So we ordered a sample of all the local sherries they had. The conclusion: We don't like Sherry. After chatting it up with a national mens basketball team the night before (in the grocery store buying gatorade), we headed off to a basketball game. Free tickets. Front row. Very different than a Lakers game in the states. For instance - no hot dogs or cheerleaders! This is more of a sunflower seed crowd. But I was up in the action.. "VAMOS CHICOS!" "DEFENSA!" "CORRE" "REBOTE" Rest assured, I compensated for the lack of cheerleaders at the game too.
After tapas, the highlight of the weekend for me was yet to come.

In Andalucia, and especially Jerez, the Christmas season involves a festivity called a Zambomba. It is a bonfire-like event, where you sing Flamenco Christmas carols and dance flamenco. Amazing right? This one was in a warehouse type place, with a bar. There was a circle of chairs for the "musicians" (mostly tambourine players) and everyone crowded around the outside clapping and chanting. It was spectacular. Feet stomping, clapping, instrument shakers, and belting out at the top of your lungs. A zambomba is also an instrument.. it is a bucket, with cloth over the top, with a stick going through it. So you move the stick up and down to hit against the bottom of the bucket. with the cloth it makes a boom sound. the zamboma and another drum keep the beat. It was especially rewarding to be familiar with the claps and rhythms from my flamenco class. I even busted out a couple little flamenco moves. And when we left, there were people all out in the street the place was so filled. And you could feel the energy bouncing off the walls. As my mom said.. now THAT is Spain.

The weekend was also nice, as a time to share with other people from my program in life back home. Only two months in.. I am already looking towards my next chapter, and planning, applying, writing, researching. And it was nice to share with the other girls in topics of graduate school, thesis talk, linguistics, family, and the world back home. I am busy with applications, getting recommendations, scholarships, fellowship, graduate school. It is a lot to think about. A lot to plan. and definitely a lot of work. But I also enjoy it, and I think the reason it is overwhelming is that there are so many options. I could do just about anything, come June. So we'll see where the wind blows me.

For now, we have school, lesson plans, school, flamenco, independent films, school, applications, decorating my apartment for christmas inexpensively, and today I am heading off to a conference for the weekend with ActionAid International - an international development organization. Looking forward to meeting some movers-and-shakers!