Bullfight

We were going to Andalucia the this past weekend so the weekend before was our last chance to see a bullfight before the season ended. We saw the last one on TV and it was pretty different: ours was a novice bullfight and the stadium was only half full (they fill one side of it so the pictures look like it's empty but it's not--half of the stadium is about 10,000 people, I think) and the final was booked and the best bullfighters were there. Ours was also way more gruesome. Three people got hit/bucked/whatever you want to call it by the bull (about 1000-1500 lbs.) and that wasn't too pretty. Also, the bullfighters aren't experienced enough to do a quick kill (severing the spinal chord in the first blow with the sword) so it wasn't pretty to watch in the end.

Here's how it works. There are four or five bulls. Each comes out, unharmed, and chases around banderillos (guys that look like matadors but with pink capes instead of red and don't have swords), then the picador comes out (guy on a armored, blindfolded (so it doesn't freak out) horse with a spear). The bull goes after the picador and gets stabbed in back. Then, the banderillos (easily the most dangerous job because they face the bulls at almost full strength) stab the bull with six little harpoons to weaken it more. Only then does the matador come out, after the bull has bled all over the place. He messes around with the bull a little more impressively than the banderillos with his cape and then stabs the bull in the spine, where upon the bull loses it's ability to stand. Then there's a person whose job it is to actually kill the bull by stabbing in the back of the head with a dagger after it's paralyzed. It's pretty disgusting. At times, beautiful, and really, really interesting (the whole thing is about tradition and show), but utterly disgusting. The first two bulls weren't that bad (there were four in total), but the second two were killed right next to us and the end of the whole ritual with the spinal chord and the dagger and everything is just awful.

Picture are below for those who want to see them. Everyone else just scroll past. I wanted to give it a proper representation here but I still spared the really gross photos.

Spanish Public Enemy #1.
The first bull wasn't aggressive enough so they sent him back in.
Banderillos.


Banderillo falls and plays dead so the bull doesn't gore him. The other banderillos come and distract the bull so he can get up.


Costumes.

Picador gets the first strike but this bull goes crazy on that horse so the banderillos try to distract again.

Crazily dangerous harpooning by the banderillo.






Now that he's all bloodied up, the matador comes out (note: red cape).
He gets hit too.
Gets up...
and finishes it...

another bull (note the six festive harpoons coming out of its back)

the last bull was a beast.

more harpoons.

So, yeah, not such a cute, festive event. I can see why the animal rights people are up in arms. I wouldn't really want to go to another (certainly not in the front row again) but I'm glad I went.

Mullet Traincar

Well, I've finally encountered the largest mullet demographic here in Spain: highschoolers. I mistakenly took a train full of these guys to Madrid for my class today and it was, perhaps, my funniest Spain experience so far. They were about 14 to 16 years old and the moment the train doors closed, a half a dozen or so took out cigarettes and started smoking. Then, amazingly, they all looked around with shifty eyes and the fifteen of them or so removed full size glasses, Fanta and Smirnoff Ice from their baggy clothing. Then they actually mixed Smirnoff Ice (what, maybe, 5% alcohol) with the Fanta and ice they bought from the "chino" (yeah, Spaniards are basically horrible people and call all convenient stores "chinese man"). They all had they're boom-box cell phones they're favorite songs and after about five minutes all started saying, "Guys... you don't even understand... I'm soooo drunk right now." Between the five different speakers playing Spanish rap, watered down Smirnoff Ice, lots of cigarettes, mullets, more ear and mouth piercings than you can shake a fist at (but only on the guys... of course), and the piece of Euro bling that one of them had (yes, actually, a giant golden € sign... I want one), it's the best Spanish party I've ever been to.

I'm going to Rome tomorrow morning!

Maricones

So I joined a gym in Spain and all the machines and weights are really weird so asked the trainer about some stuff. The end of the conversation:
Me: Thanks a lot for your help.
Trainer: No problem, but be careful, man, we’re all gay in Spain, especially in the gyms.
Me: Hahaha, okay.

What was I supposed to say?? I just tried to laugh awkwardly and end the conversation but he just kept on looking at me so I was like, “Okay, thanks again,” and I walked away. A couple of weeks later the gym got this really comical machine in that jiggles your entire body. I (stupidly) asked the trainer (a good 250lbs and possible the only Spainiard I’ve seen over 6ft.) what the purpose of the machine was. He said to relax you and vibrate your fat away, as he slid his hand around what would be my love handles if I weren’t so damn skinny. Wow. Turns out even guys have to deal with creepy Spanish men sometimes.

Oh yeah, and later that day as we were leaving the gym there was a guy on the machine singing a made-up (I hope) song which had lyrics consisting solely of “Oh gay man. Oooooooooooh, gay man.” Seriously? What?

Tarot

My host mom is taking a class in Madrid to (get ready, Rachel) become a tarot card reader. I had to try really hard to keep a straight face yesterday when she told me about it and now she’s studying in her room. I can’t believe there’s a school! Are there licenses? Are there accredited, licensed tarot card readers?? Leave it to Spain… So many questions, going to go ask my host mom now. Oh yeah, she’s also Catholic, so I don’t know exactly how that jives, but whatever.

Barcelona

It was pretty awesome. We stayed longer here than I did in Ireland. We had Thursday off (and I don’t have classes on Friday) the four of us (Amanda, Julia, Amir and I) left on an overnight train to Barcelona on Wednesday night and came back Monday morning at the crack of dawn. We stayed at really nice hostel that was a block from the main cathedral and in the heart of the gothic quarter. It had a kitchen and we made a lot of meals because we’re so broke after traveling so much. Went to the Picasso museum, had so much of his stuff from when he was four, drawing on napkins, until his death. Way cool. Gaudi’s stuff, especially la Sagrada Familia (clearly), pretty much completed me and I can cross that off my life’s list. Seriously, coolest building I’ve ever, ever seen and I’ve wanted to go ever since taking that architecture course freshman year. Yeah, yeah, nerdy. Whatever, have you seen it? Other than that, minor details: picnic in the central park, really weird “maritime museum” complete with a real, actual medieval galley, Gaudi park (seriously, where does this guy get off?), Gaudi’s house, a little bit of the Barcelona bar/club scene. Unfortunately, we missed getting to go to the big cultural center with the “magic fountain” that looks pretty much amazing because we didn’t realize it would be closed on Sunday. Jesus (and siestas) still rules on high in Spain. Oh yeah, we realized that since we have all been studying in Spain and listening to our host families’ propaganda, we’ve all have become really centralist. Everybody is just as loathe to speak castellano in Barcelona as English. Infuriating. You’re in Spain! Shut up.


One of the many awesome plazas in Barcelona.



Ummm, the meritime musuem. Pretty hilarious: included this full-size galley. Easily the most random museum i've ever been to.

Gaudi!

Park Guell


Barcelona cathedral. Ehh, compared to La Segrada Familia.
AAAHHHHHHH. This all pretty much speaks for itself.









Still very much under construction. From the 19th century until 2020, I think.

I suck at Spanish...

Alright, typical American abroad student moment: I came home one day and I wanted to use my brother’s internet connection so I asked if he was in the house. The conversation went something like this:
Me: Hey, how’s it going.
Host mom: Good. How was class?
Me: Interesting but I’m really tired. Is Hugo home?
Host mom: Yeah.
Me: Is he erect?
Host mom: What?
Me: Is he erect? Has he gotten out of bed yet?
Host mom (laughing uncontrollably): Oh, you mean is he up?

Apparently there’s some slang here that’s extremely close to the word to be awake/up and I fumbled the pronunciation. My host mom proceeded to call my host brother into the room, tell him the story and then they talked a lot about if he was erect/my Spanish/erections. Never going to live this down.

El Escorial

I saw where every single (except one, I think) King and Queen of Spain has been buried in one room since the beginning of the sixteenth century today and by far the best library I’ve ever been in: the first Arabic and Galician texts (period.) a bunch of books dating back to 600, a bible whose letters were stitched out of gold, and a giant dynamic model of the Ptolemaic universe. Oh yeah, and written on the outside the doors to the library was a warning to thieves that if they took a book, they would be hunted down, beheaded and their soul sentenced to eternal damnation. Apparently been carried out, too (well, can’t vouch for the damnation part). Take that, Book of Kells. 800 AD… psh.

Oh yeah, sorry. Don’t have any pictures of the good stuff because Spain hates camera-wielding tourists… if stealing a book = eternal damnation, I didn’t want to figure out what digital reproduction would be.

Goin’ to Barcelona next weekend… !!

Valencia

Turns out, Valencia invented paella and we went to one of the best paella places in the city, so I basically got some of the best paella in the world. Yesss… The Mediterranean was freakishly beautiful and I’m so glad we got there before it got cold this year, but it got really deep really quickly and I was none too happy. Picnic on the Mediterranean = life complete. Our last day was really eventful and we went to go see THE HOLY GRAIL. I didn’t know it had actually been found?? Monty Python logic, you mislead me! Anyway, it was pretty awesome, as was the cathedral. Then we went to Valencia’s mega-cool science center with all its ultra-modern buildings. Sorry, Boston, but Valencia’s aquarium is so much cooler: a beluga whale and I waved at each other for like 30 minutes (I have an amazing video of it but I can’t post it here). I had no idea why it was as into me as I was to it… Amanda said it’s because beluga whales are stupid. Whatever, we’re friends.

A market in Valencia... mmmmm... also, ALL the crustaceans on ice were still alive.




Mediterranean!!



THE paella.

THE holy grail.

...and where it was.

the super-crazy, Valencian science center... designed by the same guy that was supposed to design the new Freedom Towers before they decided that a foreigner wasn't allowed to.

best whale ever..

Segovia

This was such an cool, typical Spanish town. The aqueduct was awesome in-and-of-itself, but Segovia decided to throw in a massive dancing festival in front of the 2000 year-old, granite beast that day (see pictures below). I also went to my first-ever castle and saw the last period Gothic church constructed. Gotta say, I knocked on Gothic architecture all the time until I saw this thing. Absolutely beautiful, and the fact that it was built so late meant that its scale was ginormous. Spain doesn’t like people taking pictures of anything pretty, so I had to sneak some really crappy pictures after the nice lady told me to stop (I love how “Sir” is “Knight” here… waaaaaaaait, that’s the same. Wow, I’m dumb.). She didn’t notice and I didn’t use a flash… I’m sorry but WHY exactly can’t I take a photo? You want to sell more postcards?

View from a wall near the aqueduct over part of the town. the aqueduct cuts Segovia in half.




Random, outdoor folk festival that was right in front of the aqueduct with crazy (specifically) Segovian dancing.
I seriously thought about photoshopping that damn crane out of these shots, but I felt that would be a little lame...






The foot movement was crazy.


Sunset + aqueduct = impressive



The plaza at night.

Some Spanish looking street.


A famous monastery. The castle in the background.
Castle.

Crappy picture... awesome plaza.



AMAZING gothic cathedral.

Last gothic church built. Seriously HUGE scale. completely, completely ridiculous.

Here are some people for scale. The ones in the foreground don't work because they're between columns, but the ones in the background kinda do. Still doesn't do it justice and it's in the shorter wings. My camera didn't have a wide enough lens to capture this beast.




see, a dome... in a gothic church..

Castle! Got to go inside and everything... very cool.

view of the city from the castle. notice cathedral, town, and typical central spanish plains in the background.