Viva España

Viva España/ Viva el Rey/ Viva el orden/ y la ley

Long live, Spain/ Long live the King/ Long live order/ and the law

One of my Spanish friends said this brindis to cheers last night.  To which, another Spanish guy said, “that’s just something drunk people say!”  It’s probably true. 

What a fun weekend it’s shaped up to be. 

I walked around all day on Friday.  Unfortunately, it was one measly cloud away from being a beach day.  We decided to just walk along the coast.  So, we walked alongside an old canal to the contemporary art museum, which is actually in an ancient military fort.  There is a terrace at the museum that you can access for free, and there is a beautiful view of the sea.  You can see the fish market from there, as well as a lovely little square where I grabbed a coffee the other day.  In the square, there is this gothic building with a gorgeous stone angel in the doorway, and the windows are in an intricate cross design.  I was convinced it was a church, even though it didn’t have a steeple.  I asked the waitress, and she said it was la lonja, which I guess is a market.  This one was originally a market for the silk trade.  It is such a gorgeous building.  Here’s a picture of the angel in the doorway:

Anyways, Friday night, I went out for drinks with my Bolivian roommate and her Peruvian boyfriend, one of my friends, and a guy from my program who was going to live in my room if I hadn’t wanted it.  We played the game Uno and then called it a night. 

Then yesterday, some friends and I walked around the historic center again.  There was this crazy festival going on in the main plaza where little kids were wearing sleeping masks and climbing portable rock-climbing walls.  It was hilarious because the kids were so young they were wearing those jeans with the elastic waistband on the butt.  So, basically they were babies and they were blindly grasping for rocks, and I found it really funny.  Also, we stumbled upon this amazing Immigration Fair that I had read about but sort of disregarded because it sounded sort of boring… boring it was definitely not.  There was this line of tents at the park at the foot of the cathedral, and each tent had a different country in it selling delicious food and drinks, and there was music and dancing.  It was mostly Latin American tents, but there were also several African countries and European countries represented.  Then at the end of the line of tents was the biggest pan of paella I have ever seen.  It was the diameter of our old above-ground pool, I’m pretty sure, and it was BRIMMING with seafood paella.  I would have dove into it head-first if not for fear of third degree burns!

Ok, so maybe it was more like there were three pans about this size:  

But I’m especially prone to exaggeration when I’m hungry… and it seemed REALLY huge to me.  Anyways, as you can imagine, it was very delicious, and they piled it onto a big plate.  It only cost 3 euros and 50 cents so it was a steal.

Then for dessert, I had some a sweet tea and piece of cake from the Algerian tent.  The cake was so good, it was layers of crispy pastry with cream in between them, and a sugary layer sort of like the top of a nanaimo bar but vanilla.  Holy crap.  Ridiculous.  Then I waddled around for another long walk, feeling more than satisfied.

Last night, there was a Real Madrid game, and I ran into my Spanish roommate who was headed to watch it at a local bar.  I decided to go for a drink and watch the game, which ended up being a cakewalk for Madrid.  They won 6-1 to Racing Santander, one of the worst teams in the Spanish league.  But it was great hanging out.  My roommate knows the owner well, and some of his friends were there.  So, they were asking me about where I’m from, and they were telling me cool little Spanish colloquialisms.  Anyways, we ended up being there until 5 in the morning chatting and joking around.  The bar was closed to the general public, but we were just hanging around in there.  I think that’s how it works here in Spain, more or less.  If you’re friends with the bartenders or owners, the bar is always open.  Anyways, I ended up not having to pay for any of my drinks, which is great, and I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in a while.  At one point, I had tears of laughter streaming down my face.  They told me about some great Spanish music.  Here’s one of the songs they played for me.  It’s a famous flamenco group, and the lyrics of this song were actually originally a poem of my favourite Spanish poet, Federico Garcia Lorca. 

Camaron- La leyenda del tiempo

Enjoy!