This is a paper I wrote for my class, as part of a longer ´radio presentation´we were to give to the class.
Here in Salamanca, January makes for a frosty and urgent clean air of the morning. After a brief snack many jet out into the biting cold air off to work while others meet up warmly with their friends in a ´tasca´ or tapas bar for a cup of café con leche with maybe a potato tortilla or other pincho. Pinchos or tapas are somewhat of a way of life here in Salamanca. It is very normal as the day warms up into the afternoon to meet up with friends or simply to go out to meet new ones at a tapas bar for a beer and several tapas, perhaps out in a lawn chair overseeing the mystically beautiful Plaza Mayor in its loud mid-day hustle and bustle which ironically means that it´s siesta time. There are young Spaniards with strange combinations of mullets, boots, leggings and shorts as well as old men with Irish caps and old ladies with their girlfriends in big furry coats, all having in common that they must eat. All are familiar with the flavourful, tender and at least ubiquitous famous Jamón Ibérico. There are in fact lots of shops specializing in Salamancan hams, easily recognizable by the large dried legs of Iberian ham in the windows and the overwhelming musty smell of preserved meat as you enter the door. Wide varieties of sausages are available as well, from the ordinary dried and cured salchichas to the strong and lasting lomo ibérico to the spicy chorizo tinted red from the paprika mixed in to it. Most of the good ham stores have a wooden interior and somewhat of a solemn serious feeling to them,, as if these meats held the last historical ties to the old Spain that is fondly remembered. One may welcome the small as indicative of quality meats of a newcomer may be overwhelmed by the strong tons of fatty dry pork. It is a thing not necessarily sweet to all palates.
One thing that anyone will definitely love is a pastry from one of the hundred of pastry shops dotting the city that serve heavenly delights to the bending communal will of the collective Salamancan sweet tooth. Very distinctive from almost any non-culinary store, the workers at Pastry shops are always friendly and generally of pleasant humour. This may be because they understand their position of upholding the childish fantasy of everyone who passes by. No matter what age you might be, you are irrevocably a kid in a candy store in a Salamancan pasteleria. Smelling of hitherto unknown delights, always clean and with every pastry looking more irresistible than the last, the pastelerias show the limitless sweet nature of Salamanca people.
In stark contrast, the diet is curiously limited and standardized, as a matter of the terrain and customs, everyone buys their bread from a bakery and buys meat from one of the many butchers, as well as their fish from one of the less-common fish mongers. If one goes into a grocery story, it is curiously absent of all the breakfast foods, flours, seasonings and variety one might be used to in an American market. Everything is very locally specialized and aimed towards a certain traditional food that a household might make, such as the vast amounts of rice, yellow colouring and seafood aimed towards the national dish of Paella.
Perhaps because of my background in baking or maybe in spite of it, it seems incredibly interesting to me how ubiquitous the delicious crusty Spanish bread is, and how difficult it is to find flour to bake with. Hardly anyone does baking at home, leaving it to the professionals, and yet it is always present at every meal. In the US we have all kinds of home baking, but how often do we actually have quality crusty bread to eat with dinner? Only maybe if we are eating out at a restaurant. Rest assured where there is a Spaniard eating, there also is bread.
It is also a curious thing to look particularly at the spices available. An American might only recognize four or five of them, and note that there are few beyond that even available. Chives for your baked potato? Sorry. Old Bay seasoning for your shellfish? No can do. But to taste the homemade food of Salamanca makes on easily forget the lack of familiar things. A Spanish mother can somehow coax maximum flavour from the minimalist list of ingredients such as an impossibly delicious veal and potato stew that will fall apart in your mouth or perhaps a chicken and shellfish paella, soft and browned on the bottom to mouthful after mouthful of perfection. Between the pinchos and home cooking, you may just send that mothers day spice rack back and reach for that loaf of Spanish bread.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Perdido En Traducción
This is an e-mail home to my parents... I thought it described well my feelings at the moment.
Hey there!
Studying abroad is expensive. I really miss being able to have a kitchen to run back to and time to cook myself. I also miss technology, it seems impossible to find a computer with enough power to upload a video or a mass of pictures for that matter. This computer won´t even open up the blogger site. I really miss Bethany and my friends, the people here are definitely not who I would regularly hang out with. There are a couple of really authentically nice people and many interesting people, but I have found mostly otherwise people. I need to stop spending money (because that´s easy) and lighten up. It´s beginning to be a little depressing to be here, but hopefully something interesting will come up. Real classes, for example, will be starting next week so maybe that will go well. It´s just so expensive to rustle up food on excursions and while on your own. I guess I´m used to a consistent income from ORL, but I need to think about that more. And I know what you´re going to say, yes it´s hard and you shouldn´t be using it so much for snacks and you paid for meals at your house so eat then and don´t do things if you know you can´t afford them. I know all that, but meals come only twice a day wide apart and other than that I´m away from home and I in hindsight poorly decided to take the €150 trip to Lisbon which was very expensive and difficult because of people, poor planning (or simply a lack thereof) and me just not knowing anything about the place (honestly I did see lots of really cool things and had sweet experiences, there was just too much otherwise to ruin it). I also had to pay the €100 ransom for my cell phone which will be returned to me once I give it back at the end of the semester. Then of course there´s the food and hostel payments for London and Paris (so worth it, I want to go back to Paris) and little souveneirs along the way. I have been sparing with my souvenirs, leaving it to postcards, little bottles of local sorts, specialty snacks and I got this sweet old map of the world with ornate drawings and stuff on it at the Marine museum of Lisbon. That was a good day when I got that. But I´m just tired of the clicky nature of this group and how all people do is work to be popular and party, and how few seem to care about the culture and really learning and using what we´re taught. I do appreciate how lovely and motherly my madre is, she always cooks delicious things and listens and is helpful about anything she can be... when I can understand her. I don´t know... it´s a unique, interesting and priveleged experience of a lifetime to be able to study abroad and visit so many international places. But I feel broke, alone and lost in translation.
Hope all is well at home.
Love,
Kip
Hey there!
Studying abroad is expensive. I really miss being able to have a kitchen to run back to and time to cook myself. I also miss technology, it seems impossible to find a computer with enough power to upload a video or a mass of pictures for that matter. This computer won´t even open up the blogger site. I really miss Bethany and my friends, the people here are definitely not who I would regularly hang out with. There are a couple of really authentically nice people and many interesting people, but I have found mostly otherwise people. I need to stop spending money (because that´s easy) and lighten up. It´s beginning to be a little depressing to be here, but hopefully something interesting will come up. Real classes, for example, will be starting next week so maybe that will go well. It´s just so expensive to rustle up food on excursions and while on your own. I guess I´m used to a consistent income from ORL, but I need to think about that more. And I know what you´re going to say, yes it´s hard and you shouldn´t be using it so much for snacks and you paid for meals at your house so eat then and don´t do things if you know you can´t afford them. I know all that, but meals come only twice a day wide apart and other than that I´m away from home and I in hindsight poorly decided to take the €150 trip to Lisbon which was very expensive and difficult because of people, poor planning (or simply a lack thereof) and me just not knowing anything about the place (honestly I did see lots of really cool things and had sweet experiences, there was just too much otherwise to ruin it). I also had to pay the €100 ransom for my cell phone which will be returned to me once I give it back at the end of the semester. Then of course there´s the food and hostel payments for London and Paris (so worth it, I want to go back to Paris) and little souveneirs along the way. I have been sparing with my souvenirs, leaving it to postcards, little bottles of local sorts, specialty snacks and I got this sweet old map of the world with ornate drawings and stuff on it at the Marine museum of Lisbon. That was a good day when I got that. But I´m just tired of the clicky nature of this group and how all people do is work to be popular and party, and how few seem to care about the culture and really learning and using what we´re taught. I do appreciate how lovely and motherly my madre is, she always cooks delicious things and listens and is helpful about anything she can be... when I can understand her. I don´t know... it´s a unique, interesting and priveleged experience of a lifetime to be able to study abroad and visit so many international places. But I feel broke, alone and lost in translation.
Hope all is well at home.
Love,
Kip
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
La Donut Naranja
I suppose it´s about time to begin describing the rest of the town of Salamanca, so I will begin here with the most central of places, La Plaza Mayor (lit. The Biggest Plaza). The first night that we arrived, we were given the assignment of meeting the next morning in the Plaza Mayor for a short tour around here and there, so the guys in my house asked Pepe to show us how to get down there.
The first thing that is important for anyone to understand about the city of Salamanca is that the drivers are insane. Not just a little crazy and incorrigable, insane. They will speed up for the five meters they have until there is clearly a person crossing the street, they are unafraid of driving in walkways in the mornings, they will pass without a second thought or light, even if someone´s coming in the opposite direction. Insane.
So the first time walking down the Plaza Mayor reminded me very much of NYC but it seemed odd to me that all of the Spaniards waited on the sidewalk, even if noone was coming, for the little sign that says walk... as if they knew something I didn´t. A little scary, but no matter. All along the way, there were tons of ham/meat stores and lots of very random stores (clothing, electric things, kitchen supply, phone places...) and the streets are very small and narrow. On the way to the plaza mayor, I always come across this one church which is made of very old sandy stone and is completely round. It appears very much like a huge sandy round of cheese, with a cross and doors on it. This is the beginning of the centro peaton (lit. pedestrian center) which is supposedly all for pedestrians, but the stray truck or something to supply the stores therein passes by. All of this centro peaton is of stone, underfoot, many of the buildings, and also many old elaborate incredible buildings, but those will have to wait for another blog. So passing down through the centro peaton is very much like an outdoor mall. Stores of every type imaginable and useful are out there, as well as a million bars and cafes. There are delicious cafeterias con tapas, pastelerias (CON MUCHOS GALLETAS DELICIOUS that Katie drools over, of course), and so of course Katie makes me stop all the time and go in here and go in there and lo que sea. Good stuff. True enough I´d be completely bored walking around without someone to tell me to stop here and stop there... wait a minute. No. She doesn´t decide anything. I have decided to call her Sra. No Puedo Decidir Nada. Everytime I ask her ´Would you like to do this or this?¨I can´t manage to get a response other than ´I Don´t Care´or if I´m really lucky ´Me da igual´. Except with chocolate. Her one complete indulgence. And how can we blame her? Chocolate has been clinically tested to benefit the health of women, and so she´s only doing the best for her body. It all makes sense now, doesn´t it?
ANYways, finally we will arrive through a little arch into this very large illuminated (depending on the time) plaza with arches in every direction covereing beautiful stores and cafes and large facades reaching into the sky with a rustic light sandy brown color and beautiful detail and man-made stalagmites if you will. Then if you look all the way around, there is a giant bank-like front where there are several terraces on the way up, several Spanish flags and a giant clock. It´s impossible to see from right underneath, you have to go almost to the middle of the plaza to see the clock. But above the clock is a beautiful bell-tower that chimes every 15 minutes, with different sounds for the different parts of the hour.
When the sun is down in the mornings and at night, Salamanca becomes arctic and freezing with a chill to depress the heartiest Russian. But when the sun peeks over the top of the facades of the Plaza Mayor, springtime returns with a blinding strength and warmth for the body and the heart. It is an interesting cycle every day where one´s spirits it seems rise and fall with the sun itself. In the light in the late afternoon there are many people passing across the centro peaton with slow and steady old grandfathers with Irish caps and adorable old women all with their fur coats and decidedly patient meander. It is an interesting city with a peculiar cycle of life and light and also various shades of color within the city itself having to do with the lighting. In the dark all of the stone facades are dark and intimidating, as are the sketchy corners and shadows cast by various artificial lights. In the night very few people are about the streets, and so the emptyness adds extra glare to the streets and walls around the town. It becomes clear then the strange prevalence of graffiti all around, as if the young people here had nothing to do. When the sun comes up, however, it becomes a bountiful big place with lots of interesting people and light refracting off of every surface and beautiful sandy wall. With the various shades of brown it may seem at first a bit lacking flair or character, but to the contrary - it appears in more minute detail. On any facade is stone deatiling like you have never seen, with tiny characters and ornate decorations. There are various shades of buildings and writings on them in a beautiful fascinatingly new script.
Inside the beautiful Plaza Mayor, there is one particular sweets shop that I have visited several times before. But this is no ordinary sweets shop, it has hand-made pastries and chocolates and beautiful fried empanadas, all kinds of delicious foods. It has become somewhat of a mission to try as much of it as possible, at least to Katie and I. Today before a meeting to hunt down wine, I think perhaps we will visit it again to try something new. I had my eye on some gorgeous looking orange covered donuts or some such thing.
As I´m sitting here in the JMU office, Katie turns to me to say, ´I feel like going shopping, I found a bag I liked.´ Finally! She has a clear decision. My triumph of the day, next to that orange donut.
The first thing that is important for anyone to understand about the city of Salamanca is that the drivers are insane. Not just a little crazy and incorrigable, insane. They will speed up for the five meters they have until there is clearly a person crossing the street, they are unafraid of driving in walkways in the mornings, they will pass without a second thought or light, even if someone´s coming in the opposite direction. Insane.
So the first time walking down the Plaza Mayor reminded me very much of NYC but it seemed odd to me that all of the Spaniards waited on the sidewalk, even if noone was coming, for the little sign that says walk... as if they knew something I didn´t. A little scary, but no matter. All along the way, there were tons of ham/meat stores and lots of very random stores (clothing, electric things, kitchen supply, phone places...) and the streets are very small and narrow. On the way to the plaza mayor, I always come across this one church which is made of very old sandy stone and is completely round. It appears very much like a huge sandy round of cheese, with a cross and doors on it. This is the beginning of the centro peaton (lit. pedestrian center) which is supposedly all for pedestrians, but the stray truck or something to supply the stores therein passes by. All of this centro peaton is of stone, underfoot, many of the buildings, and also many old elaborate incredible buildings, but those will have to wait for another blog. So passing down through the centro peaton is very much like an outdoor mall. Stores of every type imaginable and useful are out there, as well as a million bars and cafes. There are delicious cafeterias con tapas, pastelerias (CON MUCHOS GALLETAS DELICIOUS that Katie drools over, of course), and so of course Katie makes me stop all the time and go in here and go in there and lo que sea. Good stuff. True enough I´d be completely bored walking around without someone to tell me to stop here and stop there... wait a minute. No. She doesn´t decide anything. I have decided to call her Sra. No Puedo Decidir Nada. Everytime I ask her ´Would you like to do this or this?¨I can´t manage to get a response other than ´I Don´t Care´or if I´m really lucky ´Me da igual´. Except with chocolate. Her one complete indulgence. And how can we blame her? Chocolate has been clinically tested to benefit the health of women, and so she´s only doing the best for her body. It all makes sense now, doesn´t it?
ANYways, finally we will arrive through a little arch into this very large illuminated (depending on the time) plaza with arches in every direction covereing beautiful stores and cafes and large facades reaching into the sky with a rustic light sandy brown color and beautiful detail and man-made stalagmites if you will. Then if you look all the way around, there is a giant bank-like front where there are several terraces on the way up, several Spanish flags and a giant clock. It´s impossible to see from right underneath, you have to go almost to the middle of the plaza to see the clock. But above the clock is a beautiful bell-tower that chimes every 15 minutes, with different sounds for the different parts of the hour.
When the sun is down in the mornings and at night, Salamanca becomes arctic and freezing with a chill to depress the heartiest Russian. But when the sun peeks over the top of the facades of the Plaza Mayor, springtime returns with a blinding strength and warmth for the body and the heart. It is an interesting cycle every day where one´s spirits it seems rise and fall with the sun itself. In the light in the late afternoon there are many people passing across the centro peaton with slow and steady old grandfathers with Irish caps and adorable old women all with their fur coats and decidedly patient meander. It is an interesting city with a peculiar cycle of life and light and also various shades of color within the city itself having to do with the lighting. In the dark all of the stone facades are dark and intimidating, as are the sketchy corners and shadows cast by various artificial lights. In the night very few people are about the streets, and so the emptyness adds extra glare to the streets and walls around the town. It becomes clear then the strange prevalence of graffiti all around, as if the young people here had nothing to do. When the sun comes up, however, it becomes a bountiful big place with lots of interesting people and light refracting off of every surface and beautiful sandy wall. With the various shades of brown it may seem at first a bit lacking flair or character, but to the contrary - it appears in more minute detail. On any facade is stone deatiling like you have never seen, with tiny characters and ornate decorations. There are various shades of buildings and writings on them in a beautiful fascinatingly new script.
Inside the beautiful Plaza Mayor, there is one particular sweets shop that I have visited several times before. But this is no ordinary sweets shop, it has hand-made pastries and chocolates and beautiful fried empanadas, all kinds of delicious foods. It has become somewhat of a mission to try as much of it as possible, at least to Katie and I. Today before a meeting to hunt down wine, I think perhaps we will visit it again to try something new. I had my eye on some gorgeous looking orange covered donuts or some such thing.
As I´m sitting here in the JMU office, Katie turns to me to say, ´I feel like going shopping, I found a bag I liked.´ Finally! She has a clear decision. My triumph of the day, next to that orange donut.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Noche Larga
Tonight I´m lying here feeling absolutely lost and out of element. I can´t cook, I can´t play music, I can´t hang out with my friends, I can´t call anyone, I can hardly e-mail anyone, I can´t easily find or get in contact with the people here - I can´t watch TV, I can´t hang out in any particular place to meet people... All therre is is to see people in the morning in class, walk around the city alone, talk to mama, go to bars and suffocate and be bored or get drunk with the others at night, or buy stuff. Not a very enticing list, methinks.
There is nothing right now that I want more thatn to just be in the arms of my girl and tell her everything and make some food and then either watch Iron Chef or hang out with some friends watching a movie or playing a game or whatever.
Some of these girls are so them-central and superficial, and it´s just uncomfortable for me. More than that, they seem just uninterested in cultural involvement or adaptation. There are two guys who are really good Spanish speakers, but the rest don´t seem to really care about anything but going out as many nights as possible.
I noted in a store today with Katie that Bethany would like some of the arrings they had. She seemed surprised and enquired if I was sure and how would I know that? Intrigued, I asker her to continue, wherein she told me that she wouldn´t expect a guy to know these things. My response was that absolutely it´s my job to take care of, furnish and protect a girl if and/or when I can, which seemed to srprise her that I would think that. I did add, though, that a girl has responsibilities as well: they are to keep a guy happy enough that he would like to provide these things for her. ´Most guys expect that without giving anything,´ responded Katie. While I´m sad that those would be her expectations, it does seem to make things easier for those of us who like to think of relationships as reciprocal actions. Anyways, spending that time thinking about what Bethany would like only made me miss her all the more and so I was perhaps a bit quiet and distant the rest of the day after I parted ways with Katie and her house-mate Erin, so that I could go to my doctors appointment.
Yeah... so I never mentioned what became of my extremely painful leg. By the end of my stay in Paris, my foot hurt so bad that I could barely lift it, and had to resot to a king of flat-footed flop with my right foot. The pain, of course, only got worse as I continued to walk on it until I got to Spain (and even while here). Still the tendon connecting the top of my foot to my ankle region continued to hurt and so I asked our director, Jesus to see our doctor. Luckily the visit was free and with a progrnosis of tendonitis and a presciption for anti'inflammatory drugs, off I went to spend the rest of my evening, what else, walking around by myself.
While I was walking around, I thought something that could cheer me up would be a visit to a computer where hopefully I´ll h ave a nice e-mail from Bethany and hopefully a comment or two on the blog and perhaps something I just might want to look up in Google or Wikipedia.
So the first place I thought of that I could use for a computer was the Salamanca JMU office. We were all first brought there the second day as part of our ´important sights tour,´and it began as with everything, with a stroll through a confusing maze of corners and calles (Spanish for streets). In an inconspicuous nice apartment complex, we were led up for an unassuming enclosure which turned out to house 5 computers, a bit TV, a conference room, a picture of Wilson Hall from JMU, Jesús´office, and a kitchen that we were told would hold snacks for our usage. We were also told it would be OPEN from Monday to Friday, 4-9pm.
SO with these times in mind at about 7pm I was searching Salamanca for the Calle Dimas Madariaga. I was growing impatient. And... I couldn´t remember which number the place was. Alone and frustrated, it came to me to text message Katie to ask the number. For whatever reason, I was actually kind of angry that she didn´t know even know of course we don´t carry these bits of info with us everywhere. Upset that I couldn´t figure it out, I went all the way back to my home (appr. 15-20 min walk from JMU office) and got the info myself. Ok, got the address, so I went all the way back and was graciously let in the complex by a lady after noone answered my buzzings... then I found the room... Fermé. Cerrado. Closed. Why? I could not understand and could least of all be satisfied. Grumpily I sallied forth an found an internet cafe. Declaring to myself that no matter the cost I would use it, I went in and got a pepsi and sat down. €1/hour? Not bad at all. This might not be so terrible. After a very pleasant conversation with the Spaniard next to me whose wife is coincidentally from VA, a Carribbean man walked in and started talking in one of the international phone booths. No. He wasn´t talking. He was indiscriminately and angrily shouting in some pidgin French dialect for some 10 minutes ' with the entire room staring at him with surprise. He didn´t close the door to his booth because he was standing up and gesturing angrily. We´ll just imagine that he was fighting for the transportation of food to a remote village to feed hungry people. After he left I soon ran out of time and ran home to some delicious roast chicken, potatoes, fried fish and salsa picante. I must have been quiet and surly at dinner because afterwards Austin very nicely pointed out that if I needed to talk about anything that he´d be more than happy to do so. But he and Ian went out for the night, which didn´t interest me with all the smoking and beer. So I hand'wrote a letter to B ethany anf still had trouble getting to sleep, and so here I am, laying and writing in the middle of the night feeling triste y aislado and just wishing to be sleeping somwhere familiar.
Today I bought notebooks (the class books are free) and a new mochila (book-bag) in the one-shoulder mail-carrier style, except light enough to be comfortable and reasonably inexpensive. I think to fit in better here with the locals I will soon buy new shoes and a big scarf. Maybe also a Salamanca University sweatshirt for warmth. The reason all this purchasing seems reasonable to me is that right now Salamanca stores are undergoing something of a holiday in itself -Rebajas (literally sales or rebates) where everything has ridiculously low prices with 50% or 70% - the post Christmas rush if you will.
I also had old building adventures, but these will wait for another day.
There is nothing right now that I want more thatn to just be in the arms of my girl and tell her everything and make some food and then either watch Iron Chef or hang out with some friends watching a movie or playing a game or whatever.
Some of these girls are so them-central and superficial, and it´s just uncomfortable for me. More than that, they seem just uninterested in cultural involvement or adaptation. There are two guys who are really good Spanish speakers, but the rest don´t seem to really care about anything but going out as many nights as possible.
I noted in a store today with Katie that Bethany would like some of the arrings they had. She seemed surprised and enquired if I was sure and how would I know that? Intrigued, I asker her to continue, wherein she told me that she wouldn´t expect a guy to know these things. My response was that absolutely it´s my job to take care of, furnish and protect a girl if and/or when I can, which seemed to srprise her that I would think that. I did add, though, that a girl has responsibilities as well: they are to keep a guy happy enough that he would like to provide these things for her. ´Most guys expect that without giving anything,´ responded Katie. While I´m sad that those would be her expectations, it does seem to make things easier for those of us who like to think of relationships as reciprocal actions. Anyways, spending that time thinking about what Bethany would like only made me miss her all the more and so I was perhaps a bit quiet and distant the rest of the day after I parted ways with Katie and her house-mate Erin, so that I could go to my doctors appointment.
Yeah... so I never mentioned what became of my extremely painful leg. By the end of my stay in Paris, my foot hurt so bad that I could barely lift it, and had to resot to a king of flat-footed flop with my right foot. The pain, of course, only got worse as I continued to walk on it until I got to Spain (and even while here). Still the tendon connecting the top of my foot to my ankle region continued to hurt and so I asked our director, Jesus to see our doctor. Luckily the visit was free and with a progrnosis of tendonitis and a presciption for anti'inflammatory drugs, off I went to spend the rest of my evening, what else, walking around by myself.
While I was walking around, I thought something that could cheer me up would be a visit to a computer where hopefully I´ll h ave a nice e-mail from Bethany and hopefully a comment or two on the blog and perhaps something I just might want to look up in Google or Wikipedia.
So the first place I thought of that I could use for a computer was the Salamanca JMU office. We were all first brought there the second day as part of our ´important sights tour,´and it began as with everything, with a stroll through a confusing maze of corners and calles (Spanish for streets). In an inconspicuous nice apartment complex, we were led up for an unassuming enclosure which turned out to house 5 computers, a bit TV, a conference room, a picture of Wilson Hall from JMU, Jesús´office, and a kitchen that we were told would hold snacks for our usage. We were also told it would be OPEN from Monday to Friday, 4-9pm.
SO with these times in mind at about 7pm I was searching Salamanca for the Calle Dimas Madariaga. I was growing impatient. And... I couldn´t remember which number the place was. Alone and frustrated, it came to me to text message Katie to ask the number. For whatever reason, I was actually kind of angry that she didn´t know even know of course we don´t carry these bits of info with us everywhere. Upset that I couldn´t figure it out, I went all the way back to my home (appr. 15-20 min walk from JMU office) and got the info myself. Ok, got the address, so I went all the way back and was graciously let in the complex by a lady after noone answered my buzzings... then I found the room... Fermé. Cerrado. Closed. Why? I could not understand and could least of all be satisfied. Grumpily I sallied forth an found an internet cafe. Declaring to myself that no matter the cost I would use it, I went in and got a pepsi and sat down. €1/hour? Not bad at all. This might not be so terrible. After a very pleasant conversation with the Spaniard next to me whose wife is coincidentally from VA, a Carribbean man walked in and started talking in one of the international phone booths. No. He wasn´t talking. He was indiscriminately and angrily shouting in some pidgin French dialect for some 10 minutes ' with the entire room staring at him with surprise. He didn´t close the door to his booth because he was standing up and gesturing angrily. We´ll just imagine that he was fighting for the transportation of food to a remote village to feed hungry people. After he left I soon ran out of time and ran home to some delicious roast chicken, potatoes, fried fish and salsa picante. I must have been quiet and surly at dinner because afterwards Austin very nicely pointed out that if I needed to talk about anything that he´d be more than happy to do so. But he and Ian went out for the night, which didn´t interest me with all the smoking and beer. So I hand'wrote a letter to B ethany anf still had trouble getting to sleep, and so here I am, laying and writing in the middle of the night feeling triste y aislado and just wishing to be sleeping somwhere familiar.
Today I bought notebooks (the class books are free) and a new mochila (book-bag) in the one-shoulder mail-carrier style, except light enough to be comfortable and reasonably inexpensive. I think to fit in better here with the locals I will soon buy new shoes and a big scarf. Maybe also a Salamanca University sweatshirt for warmth. The reason all this purchasing seems reasonable to me is that right now Salamanca stores are undergoing something of a holiday in itself -Rebajas (literally sales or rebates) where everything has ridiculously low prices with 50% or 70% - the post Christmas rush if you will.
I also had old building adventures, but these will wait for another day.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
No te creo.
Right now and since I have arrived, I have had so many feelings in my head that I don´t know where to start. I´m definitely not having as hard of a time adjusting as Caroline, but only because I´m here with other Americans and I speak the language well already. I send my love and as soon as possible myself out to Caroline. (I think I may be able to visit as soon as next weekend!) She has all sorts of restrictions and whatever, yes, but I can go into town and say hi if I want.
One supposes that the best place to start is the beginning. There could not have been a better person for me to see first that Katie because I think that during the semester she will be the person I relate to the best. She is responsible, familiar with the language, independent, doesn´t put up with much, loves to travel, is generally quiet, and is very hard-headed. We are good friends and hopefully we will have lots of fun adventures together.
As we were standing, waiting in the Airport, I began to see the people that I was going to be spending the semester with. There are tons of girls and few boys, and 60% stereotypical JMU college students - look and act nice, then party party - par-tay! Oh boy. Well luckily they do indeed act nice, so it´s not really that big of a deal as long as I´m not being a stereotypeical American as well. Anyways, as previously noted, we took a bus ride to Salamanca. When the bus pulled up to the place we were stopping in Salamanca, I was sitting across the aisle from Katie and we heard all the girls in the back started talking about¨Look! Are those our moms? They´re huddled around Jesus (hay-zoose) our instructor... I guess they are! Look they´re so cute, I hope I get the nice one, I bet they´re wondering the same thing - I hope I get the nice kid! Haha oh look they´re so cute!¨And things like that. Oh wow, here it is, the moment I meet my mama for 4 months. Somewhat nervously I walked off the buss in a huge mass of confused students, coats and luggage flying everywhere, a million people talking around me all at once, Jesús calling out names, mamas calling out names, kids pointing at each other and calling out names... and then there she was, calling out my roommate -Ian... and ´Krris-toh-fare?´Si! I called out. Standing there was your quintessential strong old grandmother. About 5 feet high, big glasses, but brown coat, speaking very loudly and demandingly to Jesus - ¨Son mis hijos? Diles salir conmigo, eh! Hijos! Ian y Kristohfare? Kaeepay? Keep? Si? Bueno, vamos ahora! Mi hija sale con el coche, pero no sabe cuando porque de la trafica!¨(Are those my sons? Tell them to come with me, eh! Sons! ... Yes? Good, let´s go now! My son is coming with the car, but who knows when because of the traffic.) So up pulls her son, Pepe in a nice sedan... there I am standing stupidly with my tons of luggage apologizing for how much I have, but they are trying to assure me that it´s no problem and it´ll fit. Of course they are right and off we go.
It wasn´t that far before we pulled up to a little plaza, where they led us out and around the corner to a rather nice looking entrance to an apartment complex. There wasn´t enough room for all our luggage and more than one person, so I got in the elevator alone with the stuff and soon was being pulled out on the first floor by Pepe and Ian, around the corner and there we were at our new house! Around the corner, there was a red curtain providing the entrance to the hallway. The first thing that we noticed was that it was a smaller place, but very well kept and with ornate incredibly carvings all along the hallways. Later we learned that the late husband of our mama carved all of them by hand himself! These carvings describe various sights of the city of Salamanca, various historical characters of Spain and some inconspicuous scantily clad women... It took us a little while to realize they were there. The first thing that we had to do was to choose our rooms - there were two somewhat large rooms and a smaller one. Pepe and Mama insisted that we choose by lottery, and so the smaller room was picked by our missing house-mate. As we began to unpack, the first thing our mama presented to us, happily was food! In the livingroom on the table she had set before us a plate of fried-looking things and a a rich-looking soup. Come to find out that they were more or less thick meat gravy croquettes and a very delicious lentil soup. This is going to be a great semester for food!
In his loud southern-accented Spanish, Ian excitedly told them that there was nothing like that from America and ate himself silly. I could not help but follow suit. Sometimes I like to remind Ian to continue speaking Spanish when he gives up and begins describing things excitedly in English. Anyways his first day here, he decided to buy a guitar which turned out later to be a very nice choice, if not a top-quality guitar.
Considering how much time I have to describe, and how much there is to describe, I will only continue talking about our living space and who I am living with. Later on, the second day, our third house-mate arrived: Austin. Austin is a JMU frat boy... and hasn´t had/taken? much opportunity to practice Spanish, it sounds like. But it seems to me many times that he´s trying more than Ian, in that even if he´s unsure of what the word is, he´ll try and eventually get his point across- he is trying in every sentence to use what Spanish he´s had in his few classes and is constantly learning: he has definitely gained my respect for his amount of effort put into his Spanish practice. The only problem so far is that while at home we don´t tend to be on time a lot because really many times it´s just not important... but the program directors here have been sufficiently clear that it´s important to be on time... but noone is. I try as hard as I can to be on time if not early, and we´re always waiting for the same 10 people to arrive, including my two house-mates. It just annoys me that people won´t pay attention to the people taking care of us here.
Apart from my house-mates, we´ve had lots of experiences already with the family of our Mama and Pepe, the day after we showed up, on Saturday all of a sudden Mama was setting a huge table and making lots of food - including Paella!!!. Extremely curious, the three of us stood around as family member after family member came in - and uncle, an aunt, another aunt, and 4 grandchildren! Honestly I can´t remember all of their names but if you remember, Ian bought a guitar and one of the uncles, Juan, said `Ay, permítame tocarlo`, literally `Hey, permit me to play that`. As soon as he grabbed the neck of the guitar, he began nail-picking a fast Spanish melody with very fast chord changes and a really beautiful sound. I don´t think it was a really good guitar, but he made it sing! We also talked a great deal, at least I tried to and Ian did his best. After a while I think that jet lag caught up with Austin and he just went to bed right after the meal. But with 12 people or so sitting around enjoying coffee and oranges, there were at least 4 conversations at once sinning around our heads. As was explained later to us, this family had its origins in Cadiz, Spain, which is renowned for particularly fast and blurred speech. Awesome. So we understood as much as we could and many times had to ask for clarification, but they were absolutely nothing but gracious and nice and accommodating to our lack of Spanish mastery. It turns out a great deal of the family are musicians! Of course the guitar-playing uncle (he claims it´s all just noodling around by ear... but he´s a little too good for that I think. I played Maria Schneider for him on my iPod and he said he had already heard it before which I found very unexpected) and there was a cousin who played clarinet and another who played drums and all kinds of things. Mama made a joke that we can all just play and the women will sing and dance. I was up for it.
I kept telling the family how awesome it was to have a regular weekend family meal, since I don´t have anything like that back at home. I´m more likely to have regular meals with all my friends than I am with my aunts, uncles, cousins and so forth. It was a very neat experience for everyone to be so intertwined in their lives and close enough to want to visit and hang out weekly. Being there with the family, while dizzying, was a delicious and very fun experience. Perhaps someday my own family may be so close, I´ll just have to keep up with wherever Aunt Becca might be living.
At any rate we continued talking and one of the uncles was talking about differences between the US and Spain and he mentioned that Spain´s madoals were different from the US. What? we asked. Madoals... They kept trying to repeat the word. Madonals... MacDonalds! It´s very interesting the way Spaniards use American words, they sound completely different and I keep tring to expect that it´s a Spanish word, but no, they try to mix and match. I suppose it´s like an American saying tor-til-luh.
When I worked briefly at Lori´s, I think I spent more time practicing my Spanish than being productive, and it has benefitted me I think. But the cooks used to say this one thing to me and continue to say it to me whenever I go in and talk to them again `No te creo`. So I asked the family if this meant anything, and we must have spent half an hour discussing what does it mean, yes I know what it literally means `I don`t believe you`, but is it an idiom, a saying, un dicho? No, they told me and kept trying to explain that it only means something literally, there`s no non-literal translation for it. After a while I just told them, `¿No tiene otro sentido? No se creo.` - `It doesn`t have another meaning? No te creo.` From then on it just became the joke of the evening to explain away just about any confusion. Good times. I guess you had to be there. You weren`t there? No te creo.
One supposes that the best place to start is the beginning. There could not have been a better person for me to see first that Katie because I think that during the semester she will be the person I relate to the best. She is responsible, familiar with the language, independent, doesn´t put up with much, loves to travel, is generally quiet, and is very hard-headed. We are good friends and hopefully we will have lots of fun adventures together.
As we were standing, waiting in the Airport, I began to see the people that I was going to be spending the semester with. There are tons of girls and few boys, and 60% stereotypical JMU college students - look and act nice, then party party - par-tay! Oh boy. Well luckily they do indeed act nice, so it´s not really that big of a deal as long as I´m not being a stereotypeical American as well. Anyways, as previously noted, we took a bus ride to Salamanca. When the bus pulled up to the place we were stopping in Salamanca, I was sitting across the aisle from Katie and we heard all the girls in the back started talking about¨Look! Are those our moms? They´re huddled around Jesus (hay-zoose) our instructor... I guess they are! Look they´re so cute, I hope I get the nice one, I bet they´re wondering the same thing - I hope I get the nice kid! Haha oh look they´re so cute!¨And things like that. Oh wow, here it is, the moment I meet my mama for 4 months. Somewhat nervously I walked off the buss in a huge mass of confused students, coats and luggage flying everywhere, a million people talking around me all at once, Jesús calling out names, mamas calling out names, kids pointing at each other and calling out names... and then there she was, calling out my roommate -Ian... and ´Krris-toh-fare?´Si! I called out. Standing there was your quintessential strong old grandmother. About 5 feet high, big glasses, but brown coat, speaking very loudly and demandingly to Jesus - ¨Son mis hijos? Diles salir conmigo, eh! Hijos! Ian y Kristohfare? Kaeepay? Keep? Si? Bueno, vamos ahora! Mi hija sale con el coche, pero no sabe cuando porque de la trafica!¨(Are those my sons? Tell them to come with me, eh! Sons! ... Yes? Good, let´s go now! My son is coming with the car, but who knows when because of the traffic.) So up pulls her son, Pepe in a nice sedan... there I am standing stupidly with my tons of luggage apologizing for how much I have, but they are trying to assure me that it´s no problem and it´ll fit. Of course they are right and off we go.
It wasn´t that far before we pulled up to a little plaza, where they led us out and around the corner to a rather nice looking entrance to an apartment complex. There wasn´t enough room for all our luggage and more than one person, so I got in the elevator alone with the stuff and soon was being pulled out on the first floor by Pepe and Ian, around the corner and there we were at our new house! Around the corner, there was a red curtain providing the entrance to the hallway. The first thing that we noticed was that it was a smaller place, but very well kept and with ornate incredibly carvings all along the hallways. Later we learned that the late husband of our mama carved all of them by hand himself! These carvings describe various sights of the city of Salamanca, various historical characters of Spain and some inconspicuous scantily clad women... It took us a little while to realize they were there. The first thing that we had to do was to choose our rooms - there were two somewhat large rooms and a smaller one. Pepe and Mama insisted that we choose by lottery, and so the smaller room was picked by our missing house-mate. As we began to unpack, the first thing our mama presented to us, happily was food! In the livingroom on the table she had set before us a plate of fried-looking things and a a rich-looking soup. Come to find out that they were more or less thick meat gravy croquettes and a very delicious lentil soup. This is going to be a great semester for food!
In his loud southern-accented Spanish, Ian excitedly told them that there was nothing like that from America and ate himself silly. I could not help but follow suit. Sometimes I like to remind Ian to continue speaking Spanish when he gives up and begins describing things excitedly in English. Anyways his first day here, he decided to buy a guitar which turned out later to be a very nice choice, if not a top-quality guitar.
Considering how much time I have to describe, and how much there is to describe, I will only continue talking about our living space and who I am living with. Later on, the second day, our third house-mate arrived: Austin. Austin is a JMU frat boy... and hasn´t had/taken? much opportunity to practice Spanish, it sounds like. But it seems to me many times that he´s trying more than Ian, in that even if he´s unsure of what the word is, he´ll try and eventually get his point across- he is trying in every sentence to use what Spanish he´s had in his few classes and is constantly learning: he has definitely gained my respect for his amount of effort put into his Spanish practice. The only problem so far is that while at home we don´t tend to be on time a lot because really many times it´s just not important... but the program directors here have been sufficiently clear that it´s important to be on time... but noone is. I try as hard as I can to be on time if not early, and we´re always waiting for the same 10 people to arrive, including my two house-mates. It just annoys me that people won´t pay attention to the people taking care of us here.
Apart from my house-mates, we´ve had lots of experiences already with the family of our Mama and Pepe, the day after we showed up, on Saturday all of a sudden Mama was setting a huge table and making lots of food - including Paella!!!. Extremely curious, the three of us stood around as family member after family member came in - and uncle, an aunt, another aunt, and 4 grandchildren! Honestly I can´t remember all of their names but if you remember, Ian bought a guitar and one of the uncles, Juan, said `Ay, permítame tocarlo`, literally `Hey, permit me to play that`. As soon as he grabbed the neck of the guitar, he began nail-picking a fast Spanish melody with very fast chord changes and a really beautiful sound. I don´t think it was a really good guitar, but he made it sing! We also talked a great deal, at least I tried to and Ian did his best. After a while I think that jet lag caught up with Austin and he just went to bed right after the meal. But with 12 people or so sitting around enjoying coffee and oranges, there were at least 4 conversations at once sinning around our heads. As was explained later to us, this family had its origins in Cadiz, Spain, which is renowned for particularly fast and blurred speech. Awesome. So we understood as much as we could and many times had to ask for clarification, but they were absolutely nothing but gracious and nice and accommodating to our lack of Spanish mastery. It turns out a great deal of the family are musicians! Of course the guitar-playing uncle (he claims it´s all just noodling around by ear... but he´s a little too good for that I think. I played Maria Schneider for him on my iPod and he said he had already heard it before which I found very unexpected) and there was a cousin who played clarinet and another who played drums and all kinds of things. Mama made a joke that we can all just play and the women will sing and dance. I was up for it.
I kept telling the family how awesome it was to have a regular weekend family meal, since I don´t have anything like that back at home. I´m more likely to have regular meals with all my friends than I am with my aunts, uncles, cousins and so forth. It was a very neat experience for everyone to be so intertwined in their lives and close enough to want to visit and hang out weekly. Being there with the family, while dizzying, was a delicious and very fun experience. Perhaps someday my own family may be so close, I´ll just have to keep up with wherever Aunt Becca might be living.
At any rate we continued talking and one of the uncles was talking about differences between the US and Spain and he mentioned that Spain´s madoals were different from the US. What? we asked. Madoals... They kept trying to repeat the word. Madonals... MacDonalds! It´s very interesting the way Spaniards use American words, they sound completely different and I keep tring to expect that it´s a Spanish word, but no, they try to mix and match. I suppose it´s like an American saying tor-til-luh.
When I worked briefly at Lori´s, I think I spent more time practicing my Spanish than being productive, and it has benefitted me I think. But the cooks used to say this one thing to me and continue to say it to me whenever I go in and talk to them again `No te creo`. So I asked the family if this meant anything, and we must have spent half an hour discussing what does it mean, yes I know what it literally means `I don`t believe you`, but is it an idiom, a saying, un dicho? No, they told me and kept trying to explain that it only means something literally, there`s no non-literal translation for it. After a while I just told them, `¿No tiene otro sentido? No se creo.` - `It doesn`t have another meaning? No te creo.` From then on it just became the joke of the evening to explain away just about any confusion. Good times. I guess you had to be there. You weren`t there? No te creo.
Friday, January 18, 2008
Aqui en Salamanca! Finalmente!
The train ride to Madrid was long and surprisingly very hot. When I got to my room there were two Brazilian guys about my age in there, and no space. I have certainly overpacked for this trip, my main mistake being the HUGE carry-bag. It wasn´t my first choice, but someone convinced me to take the bigger briefcase. Bad idea. Anyways, I managed to fit my stuff in the room and the trip went rather quietly apart from waking up randomly for someone´s snoring and hearing a voice say ¨Chamartin, Madrid¨(our destination) and frantically making sure I wasn´t in trouble when the train strarted moving again.
The worst part of arriving alone in any city is figuring out alone how to get around. Those maps that Becca gave me have been my life-lines to getting places quickly. After getting impossibly fast responses to all my questions from Spanish personnell, eventually I figured out how to get to the airport from the trainstation. Once at the airport... I had no idea where we were supposed to meet, I just knew 1pm. That gave me two hours to scour the airport for anyone I might recognixe. I tried to use my last change in my pocket to call the JMU office in Salamanca from a Pay'phone, but no luck, I couldn´t figure it out and got a wrong number in stead. It really sucked lugging around all that luggage and I was starting to sweatÑ in preparation for meeting my host mom, I was wearing my brown dress shoes and pants, red button down shirt, and my lovely green v-neck sweater. I also had on my long coat, cap and scarf. As I said... sweating. I figured that with the firm 1pm deadline that they gave us, some people might be early and I would find them. So searching searching...
It was with great surprise, relief, and joy that very suddenly I was walking towards the one person in the program that I know: Katie Reed in a JMU sweatshirt! We quickly swapped stories and concerns about not being able to find anyone else and more people showed up. At this point came the most pleasant feeling thing in a week or so - I would walk away from my stuff and get a drink without worrying a bit. It´s an interesting point of personal security. for once in a while, I felt a part of a community, without worrying about myself or anything for that matter. I have learned in my travels that I enjoy the independence to may my own decisions about whatever I´m interested in, but I thrive on the interactions of my decisions with others. Unless it´s important to my personal health or well being, I love to share stuff - feelings, moments, places, food (as you all know)... I am very glad to be with people again because now I can share again.
Some people didn´t make it in time, and there are still in fact some in random places across Europe - so much for 1pm. Katie and I have noted that maybe we´ll take a weekend trip to Basque country to see the Bilbao and the restaurant El Bulli in Roses, El Bulli is the number one rated restaurant in the world. It has both a restaurant, a kitchen, a workshop and many patents on their culinary creations - machines and food alike. The fixed price for their menu is €170. I would still go, and maybe I will someday.
Once everyone we thought would arrive in reasonable time was there, we left for Salamanca from the Madrid airport. The drive to Salamanca was an interesting introduction to Spain. Everywhere is sun-parched land and farming fields, and little buelos that we quickly drive through. We even passed a funeral. It´s beautiful land, in the same way as perhaps Arizona. In each pueblo, the one thing that sticks out is always a large ancient-looking Cathedral/Iglesia. The Spanish Catholic traditions live on, for better or for worse. There are also tons and tons of cranes, whatever they might be for.
I have actually arrived in Salamanca and am right now writing this in the room of my host mother´s son´s room. I don´t have time right now to describe everything I´ve seen here already, so that will wait for another post.
Miss you all!
Kip
The worst part of arriving alone in any city is figuring out alone how to get around. Those maps that Becca gave me have been my life-lines to getting places quickly. After getting impossibly fast responses to all my questions from Spanish personnell, eventually I figured out how to get to the airport from the trainstation. Once at the airport... I had no idea where we were supposed to meet, I just knew 1pm. That gave me two hours to scour the airport for anyone I might recognixe. I tried to use my last change in my pocket to call the JMU office in Salamanca from a Pay'phone, but no luck, I couldn´t figure it out and got a wrong number in stead. It really sucked lugging around all that luggage and I was starting to sweatÑ in preparation for meeting my host mom, I was wearing my brown dress shoes and pants, red button down shirt, and my lovely green v-neck sweater. I also had on my long coat, cap and scarf. As I said... sweating. I figured that with the firm 1pm deadline that they gave us, some people might be early and I would find them. So searching searching...
It was with great surprise, relief, and joy that very suddenly I was walking towards the one person in the program that I know: Katie Reed in a JMU sweatshirt! We quickly swapped stories and concerns about not being able to find anyone else and more people showed up. At this point came the most pleasant feeling thing in a week or so - I would walk away from my stuff and get a drink without worrying a bit. It´s an interesting point of personal security. for once in a while, I felt a part of a community, without worrying about myself or anything for that matter. I have learned in my travels that I enjoy the independence to may my own decisions about whatever I´m interested in, but I thrive on the interactions of my decisions with others. Unless it´s important to my personal health or well being, I love to share stuff - feelings, moments, places, food (as you all know)... I am very glad to be with people again because now I can share again.
Some people didn´t make it in time, and there are still in fact some in random places across Europe - so much for 1pm. Katie and I have noted that maybe we´ll take a weekend trip to Basque country to see the Bilbao and the restaurant El Bulli in Roses, El Bulli is the number one rated restaurant in the world. It has both a restaurant, a kitchen, a workshop and many patents on their culinary creations - machines and food alike. The fixed price for their menu is €170. I would still go, and maybe I will someday.
Once everyone we thought would arrive in reasonable time was there, we left for Salamanca from the Madrid airport. The drive to Salamanca was an interesting introduction to Spain. Everywhere is sun-parched land and farming fields, and little buelos that we quickly drive through. We even passed a funeral. It´s beautiful land, in the same way as perhaps Arizona. In each pueblo, the one thing that sticks out is always a large ancient-looking Cathedral/Iglesia. The Spanish Catholic traditions live on, for better or for worse. There are also tons and tons of cranes, whatever they might be for.
I have actually arrived in Salamanca and am right now writing this in the room of my host mother´s son´s room. I don´t have time right now to describe everything I´ve seen here already, so that will wait for another post.
Miss you all!
Kip
Thursday, January 17, 2008
La Día Final de Paris
Ah, my last day in Paris. After last night's glorious meal I even managed to get up early at about 9 this morning. Nolw checked out of the hostel, I mst find things to do before I return to get my stuff and leave at about 6. I might go back to Wadja if I can at 4:30 or 5, for now I am visiting the French National Middle Ages Museum and I'd like to revisit the Pompidou, maybe even get a chance to go in this time, St. Sulpice and see the Museé Guimet.
(later) After the very beautiful and interesting middle ages mseum, I found a place nearby claiming Tapas - French tapas. Out of curiosity I went in for a little snack. It turns out that the place was a very snooty French place wanting to be ultra modern, but all it was was a fashion statement with not very nice waiters, no culinary love at all. So I ate what I could of my two not very good dishes and hit the road.
I saw today the only two lingerie stores yet in Paris, this was surprising to me as there are at least a million clothing stores and given the reputation of France in the love department, I would have expected more. But I did get to see St. Sulpice. Of course the only reason I wanted to go there is because it was mentioned in the Da Vinci Code, but it really was a very very beautiful place. Right now part of the North West tower is being worked on, but that didn't mean anything because that whole bit is separate from the main space - a lot of it was, it makes me wonder what all there is that the average visitor can't see up on the higher floors and in he towers. It was very beautiful with an extraordinarily elaborate speaker's podium and an intimidating looking organ high above the entrance.
(later) So I got to see the Pompidou! Inside! and I discovered soemthing about my artistic tastes - they mostly lie in function. For example one of my favorite things I saw there was this one piece that demonstrated a 'some-construction-needed' chair which included just a bunch of wooden pieces that looked basically like boomerangs with holes in them, and it came with pipes to put through the holes as you like. It seemed to me such an interesting way to produce a chair - with easily replaceable parts, changeable, and pretty cool looking. I also really enjoyed loking at the architectural models that maximized efficiency and ecological positivity. In the gift shop there were several culinary pieces that cuaght my eye - mostly art springing out of normal utensils - pretty cool. Also while in the Pompidou, I sketched a girl's boot because I liked it so much - it reminded me of an Italian equestrian boot: very rustic brown leather with a strong heel and attractive upper calf straps, attractively seamed outside and zipper on the inside. You know, I've seen two people in the past couple of days on the metro who looked like they just hopped off a horse - very curious... where would you find a horse in Paris other than the Police at the Versailles Gardens (I could spend forever there)? Also in the metro I have seen lots of musicians - violin players, saxophones, guitar players - but today has been an especially good day for Metro Music. On my way around I heard a VERY good duet of trumpet and saxophone playing In a Sentimental Mood by Ellington (or Strayhorn?) and at 4pm today at the Le Châtelet stop I came across a 7-piece String Ensemble playing sonatas and classical music! A bass, two cellos, one viola and three violins. I couldn't believe it! I had time to stop and sketch them a little and they sounded fabulous! Better than groups at JMU... through perhaps that doesn't say too much.
So I will go get myself a Grand Marniére and Nutella (they love nutella here, it's everywhere! And dead tasty - hazelnut + chocolate = yum) crépe and then it's off to Spain for me! Au revoir, Paris! Je t'aime!
(later) After the very beautiful and interesting middle ages mseum, I found a place nearby claiming Tapas - French tapas. Out of curiosity I went in for a little snack. It turns out that the place was a very snooty French place wanting to be ultra modern, but all it was was a fashion statement with not very nice waiters, no culinary love at all. So I ate what I could of my two not very good dishes and hit the road.
I saw today the only two lingerie stores yet in Paris, this was surprising to me as there are at least a million clothing stores and given the reputation of France in the love department, I would have expected more. But I did get to see St. Sulpice. Of course the only reason I wanted to go there is because it was mentioned in the Da Vinci Code, but it really was a very very beautiful place. Right now part of the North West tower is being worked on, but that didn't mean anything because that whole bit is separate from the main space - a lot of it was, it makes me wonder what all there is that the average visitor can't see up on the higher floors and in he towers. It was very beautiful with an extraordinarily elaborate speaker's podium and an intimidating looking organ high above the entrance.
(later) So I got to see the Pompidou! Inside! and I discovered soemthing about my artistic tastes - they mostly lie in function. For example one of my favorite things I saw there was this one piece that demonstrated a 'some-construction-needed' chair which included just a bunch of wooden pieces that looked basically like boomerangs with holes in them, and it came with pipes to put through the holes as you like. It seemed to me such an interesting way to produce a chair - with easily replaceable parts, changeable, and pretty cool looking. I also really enjoyed loking at the architectural models that maximized efficiency and ecological positivity. In the gift shop there were several culinary pieces that cuaght my eye - mostly art springing out of normal utensils - pretty cool. Also while in the Pompidou, I sketched a girl's boot because I liked it so much - it reminded me of an Italian equestrian boot: very rustic brown leather with a strong heel and attractive upper calf straps, attractively seamed outside and zipper on the inside. You know, I've seen two people in the past couple of days on the metro who looked like they just hopped off a horse - very curious... where would you find a horse in Paris other than the Police at the Versailles Gardens (I could spend forever there)? Also in the metro I have seen lots of musicians - violin players, saxophones, guitar players - but today has been an especially good day for Metro Music. On my way around I heard a VERY good duet of trumpet and saxophone playing In a Sentimental Mood by Ellington (or Strayhorn?) and at 4pm today at the Le Châtelet stop I came across a 7-piece String Ensemble playing sonatas and classical music! A bass, two cellos, one viola and three violins. I couldn't believe it! I had time to stop and sketch them a little and they sounded fabulous! Better than groups at JMU... through perhaps that doesn't say too much.
So I will go get myself a Grand Marniére and Nutella (they love nutella here, it's everywhere! And dead tasty - hazelnut + chocolate = yum) crépe and then it's off to Spain for me! Au revoir, Paris! Je t'aime!
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