Cultural Inundation

I got a lot of Spanish culture this weekend...I´m pretty stoked about that. Thursday night, a bunch of my friends met up at a Salsa club and I had the best time. I decided I´m going to take lessons every Monday and Wednesday at a place near my house. Friday night, we went to a Flamenco bar which we now know is world-renown. Our senora had told us that the place opens at 11, so we got there around 11:30, thinking we would be fashionably late. When we arrived, there was a line of people down the street and a woman told me the place didn´t open until midnight. So we were near the front of the line and we waited outside along with the group of older Spaniards...some people were a little nervous because clearly it wasn´t exactly our age range. Once the place opened, people poured inside mosh-pit style. I got trampled a few times by 70 year old ladies and once we actually got inside, all the seats were taken so we stood on the side lines. It was a little hole in the wall place that had the look of a rustic living room. There is no entrance fee but the key is that you have to buy a drink--and they are not cheap. A little while before the actual flamenco show started, some really old lady walked past me wearing a sequin shirt and pounds of makeup. Behind her was a young guy in an ostentatious suit. I realized that everyone was staring at her, taking photos, whistling. I asked the guy next to me what was going on and he told me he was from Italy and also had no idea. I found out later she was a famous actress in Spain when she was younger (she´s probably 80 years old now) named Sara Montiel. I saw her on the news yesterday, on a celebrity documentary thing. So that was pretty neat...but nothing compared to the incredible flamenco show that followed. There is a reason that people were lined up outside to get in and that after it was full, people watched through the windows for hours. There was singing, guitar playing, drumming, and best of all, dancing. I took a video of it so I´ll post it sometime. It was so worth the wait, the standing like sardines, and the 7 euro drinks.


Saturday, we got up really early and met our group at the train station for our excursion to Mulva, which is the site of ancient ruins of an old castle. The train ride was about an hour and we hiked for about 40 minutes until we reached the site. It is literally in the middle of nowhere, the only sign of life the cows and horses of the countryside. I really enjoyed the different perspective of Spanish life...outside of the urban hustle and bustle of the cities. Anyway, the ruins were really neat, built into a small mountain, and more or less conserved enough to be able to imagine what it once looked like. Anyway, after our climb up through the ruins, we had some free time to explore on our own and eat our bagged lunches. While we were sitting at the bottom of the mountain, a horse walked up to us, completely tame and beautiful! We all took turns feeding it our apples and then decided to take turns riding it. We later found it was our tour guide´s horse so it really isn´t as crazy as it sounds. But it was all bareback and we felt so adventurous. We had a 2 hour hike to the nearest town to catch the train back.

After dinner Saturday, I met with another intercambio who wanted to learn English. Jose Luis works for the city and basically ensures that all the chemical plants are complying with the laws. He studied environmental science in Cordoba and did an internship in Vienna. On Wednesday, he is directing a convention in Brussels and has to speak in English so he wants as much practice as he can get before then. We got ice cream and met some other people at Alfalfa street. Sunday, after lunch, I went to the park for a while and just read and listened to music. I was really enjoying my little spurt of down time. Then, I met Meghann at the Parque de Maria Luisa to check out the international festival. There were booths of vendors and food tasting and belly dancing and music and tons of people. It is soo much fun and is going on every night until November so I´m definitely going to go back soon. I ran into my German friend Vitali there and we all tried Yuca frita from the Peruvian booth.