Matthias von Richard

2011-08-22T14:15:00.000-07:00

Bogotá sits at 2,660 meters. That means two things that Matt(hew) does are highly affected by the altitute: drinking and walking. I never got the soroche altitude sickness that is so common here, and at first I thought that I had actually escaped any effects from the height whatsoever. This was proved wrong.

The first moment I really go the point was when I met with Mike Hower for a few drinks the other night. While prepping to come to Colombia, I found a blog called The Tall Gringo, by a Californian living and teaching English here in Bogotá. I sent him an e-mail telling him how helpful I found his reflections, and he said he was grateful, and that if I ever wanted to get a beer while in town, I should contact him. I did, and during the Bachelorette party that took Caro away for a bit, I met up with him and some of his friends. I had I think about 4 beers, maybe 5, in three or four hours. Well, well within my usual drinking capacity, but I found myself quite tipsy. Luckily Caro came around and hung out for a while and she more or less guided me home. I wasn't really drunk, but I was surprised that I was a tired as I was. I then woke up with a really bad hangover, which I am totally unaccustomed to, and so whined about incessantly. I looked up articles of decent repute saying that depending on the study you look at, being at 3000 meters or above can be anything from an almost doubling of the effect of alcohol, to a nil effect "that's an urban legend" level. I don't know about the science of the studies, but I don't believe for a second that going from sea level to 2700 m makes no difference on alcohol. Just saying y'all, just saying. Incidentally the conversation was good, as was the beer.

Stairs get a mention regarding altitude, because I don't get tired walking around here in Bogotá, but I feel the altitude in the stairs. It doesn't take many stairs to feel it. I guess it's just remarkable, because I know how my body feels doing exercise. If I go up 100 stairs, I know basically how much my legs should burn, how much I should be sweating, how winded I should be, I have a good sense of it. Here, though, it's all out of kilter. I go up the stairs at a light job and there's no heating up, no heavy legs, but my chest just feels like it has no air. I am not a barrel-chested man, but I can see how that would be useful. I wonder how long it would take for me to get use to it...

Final point on cooking: I have never lived in a house with a servant. But Belmita cleans everything, does all the cooking and the dishes. I find this slightly unusual, and also a bit galling what with my egalitarian streak. I've cooked a few times, but it's with air of indulgence, like I'm stretching the house's norms a bit. Everyone's fine, and no one one really cares, but I do sometimes just do my dishes really quickly, and once Belmita saw me and just quietly thanked me and laughed. Matt(hew) has no kitchen of homey cooking in Bogotá...

Till next!

Playing Catch Up

2011-08-21T06:28:00.000-07:00

Been in Colombia for about five days now, and there has been a lot of Colombian-ness afoot. Every night I come back to Caro's house too tired to do much writing, but this morning, I've committed myself to getting something down!

Perhaps the most impressive thing I've done here so far is what is the least surprising: a car tour of the city. Caro's uncle, Ricardo, or Richie to everyone, took us on about a two hour trip through northern Bogotá, through several neighborhoods, and the differences were what I found most interesting. Bogotá has six estratos, or levels. They're administrative divisions, and they determine zoning laws and utilities pricing. In estrato 1 you pay next to nothing, or nothing, for water and electricity, whereas in in estrato 6 you pay the most, which seems to be a way to subsidize utilities for usage in poorer areas. Everyone thinks in terms of these areas, so if you drive through the estratos, you can see the increasing and decreasing affluence.

Caro's neighborhood looks like it was all built in the 70s, with brick buildings that are being repurposed for stores, so her area is becoming very commercial. But other neighborhoods are right up next to the mountains, and they are modern looking highrises, like where Richie lives. We also drove through a neighborhood of houses on a quiet street that look just as residential as Wallingford, though each one has a high fence. Then there was the center, which includes the old Colonial part of town, where people were clearly much poorer, with people grilling on all the corners, dirty streets, begging and just a huge amount of crowding.

Maybe that's the most striking thing about Bogotá, and the hardest to capture, which is the contrast. It's easy to say that some people have nice new cars, and other people ride crammed buses, but seeing them next to each is impossible to convey well in words. And it's not all about social issues, it goes from pouring, just pouring rain here, to sunny clear skies, in about an hour. And it will do it twice in one day! I was talking to Pilar, Caro's mother, whom I have taken to calling Doñita Pili, and said I wasn't sure what to wear, because the weather changes so often! She just looked at me and said they have no idea either. It doesn't matter how long you live there, it's impossible to dress right.

Although that does make me think of another funny habit I'm having to overcome here. Being too respectful. I use the usted form here with people, because I want to be respectful, but it's pretty much the least respectful thing I could do. Basically, I want to call people "sir," but it just doesn't fly here. In stores or with Caro's family, they look at me like I just insulted them, because why am I creating that distance? Hence "Doñita Pili," which I suppose is the equivalent of calling me "Mr. Matt" in English. Not really respectful, but just close enough...

But today will be dominated by Andrea's wedding, Caro's sister. In fact, while I sit here typing, a considerable amount of bustle in dominating the house, for which I am attempting just to stay out of the away. More adventures soonish.

Also, is anyone still reading this? If so, I get in at 10:55 AM on Saturday, September 3rd. Cool people be warned. Dirk and Sarah, I'm looking at you. Best from down south!

To bed!

2011-08-15T19:50:00.000-07:00

I am a tired Matthew, but I'll make a quick post, since I know if I take too long to post, momentum will be lost.

Well, I've been here... two and a half days now, and it's been really nice, I have to say. Carolina's family has been great to me, and there is certainly no better way to be introduced to Bogotá. My Spanish skills were put to the test and not found wanting. I do, of course, make many errors, but I was pleasantly surprised by how well it all goes. Yay for multi-lingualism.

I have been tired, though. Not horribly, but I'm sure that I was somewhat jet-lagged, and additionally they all warned me about "soroche," which is basically mild altitude sickness, which I probably am experiencing. I don't feel bad, per se, but I do have a mild headache and just feel fatigued. But, after stressful packing and traveling, jet-lag, and an altitude shift, who knows where it comes from.

Let me now move into the section on fairly superficial generalized exoticisms: Colombian fruit. Colombians are all about the fruit. Juices, delicious, everywhere. And so many fruit I had never tried, and some had never even heard of. Naranjilla is acidic, like lemon, but creamy-like. Guanaban (in English, apparently Soursop) is great too, though not very sweet. The prize goes to Granadilla, though, which literally means "small pomergranite." They do look the same, but you can eat the seeds of this fruit, and each one is encased in this membrane that could not be more reminiscent of snot. Delicious. I'll leave you with that image.

I will write more soon, but I wanted to say I was alive and wanted to post. Till soon all! Best from Bogotá!

Back date post!

2011-08-15T19:48:00.000-07:00

Panama Airport. 8:00 local time, 15:00 in Berlin. Despite having a connecting flight from here to Bogotá, booked online, the plane was told that all passengers would have to leave security, enter customs, collect their bags, get a new tickets at the front desk, and then reenter through security. Aren't there legitimate reasons why you wouldn't want to go through customs in one country, but not in another? I can image this being difficult for some people, especially if you have a tight connection. I am not the case, so I did as I was told. Once I got to the carrousel, some attendant asked for my ticket stub and said my luggage was checked through. I told him I was told to pick it up and he gave me a big smile full of braces and told me they do that pretty often. Excellent. Well, I did go through customs and get a Panamanian stamp, so there's a souvenir for me. Going back through security was also a bit interesting. In order to get into line to walk through security, the guard took my passport and gave it a real looking over. The people behind probably hated me. It's a brand new passport, though, so it probably looks a bit suspicious. I might venture to say that the majority of Americans going to Panama might have been somewhere else already. Additionally, despite being the only time I've had to take my shoes off outside the US, I put my passport in a bag, which went into the scanner. When they asked me for it, I told them it was in my bag. The woman asking me looked at the guy behind the scanner, the scanner guy looked back. He shrugged. She sighed. I went through without a passport check. I would love a coffee, but I only have Euros. They might very well take them. I don't want to withdraw local currency, though, so I'll wait until I'm on the plane (what is it here anyway, the Colon?).

I wonder what side of the isthmus I'm on right now. Depending, I could already be in South America. So far Spanish has stood me in good stead. I'm spoken no English to any official, though my guess is they could manage well enough. I see quite a few Americans and Europeans muddling through questions to people. I'm also munching away on my vast supply of trail mix, which was a godsend given that every year airline food seems to approach soilent green ever more perfectly, and I only ate half of my dinner and none of my lunch that they gave me. Speaking of trail mix, though, I made an interesting linguistic discovery. Some of you might remember that I've mentioned a few times that Germans differentiate between types of plums. The mostly round all over, globe like plums are called Pflaumen, a cognate, but the smaller plums with a teardrop shape are called Zwetschgen. I always thought it was funny that we never differentiated in English, since yes they are similar, but we say peach and nectarine even though the only difference is a mutation to get rid of the hair, clearly we don't ignore all differences. But mystery solved people. The teardrop plums are properly called prunes. They're not as juicy, though, so they dry easily, hence being associated with dried fruit. Bam! Linguistic riddled solved. At any rate, I bought a bag of trail mix and threw in two bars of chocolate and a bag of prunes. In a final bit of linguistic fun, Germans call trail mix Studentfutter - which means student feed, like animal feed. Colombians apparently call it a bunch of nuts and dried fruits in a bag, according to Caro.

Well, I have to finish an essay for the class I just finished at that German university from where I won't graduate and whose grades won't follow me anywhere, but for which I fear bizarrely, almost manically responsible. I should probably just say screw it and pay more attention to the people and places, which I am, but I'll worry until I'm done, so it's best just to get it out of the way. As a final observation I can make, though, before signing off and getting back to work, is how still very socialized to Seattle I am. Point in case: women's heels. As perhaps the most heel-averse city in the world, I continue to be shocked by their ubiquity elsewhere. Strangely enough, any heel over about an inch seems sort of pornographic to me, like too exaggerated to be taken seriously. Like a corset or something, just too unnecessarily unnatural. To all short women and those who find heels empowering or otherwise gratifying, I do support you, but I will speedwalk right by you in the airport to get a better place in line, and I won't feel bad about it. To work!

About to depart

2011-08-11T00:32:00.000-07:00

I am about to depart for Colombia! As with so many blogs, it begins with the sudden desire and energy of departure. This is, I think, the third or fourth departure in this blog, but so it goes. I'm getting lunch with Andreas, my boss, and then will come back to Caro's place, get my luggage, and will then jet off into the blue!

Well, actually I'll take the train to Leipzig, and then to Frankfurt, and then check in, and then fly into the blue!

Little things

2011-03-20T10:08:00.000-07:00

I'm back people. At least for another post. Lots of little things afoot. I would need to post every other day to give them the time they deserve? That is the product of many small lazy decisions culminating is a lameness on my part, so I'll get right into actual life and no waxing about it.

Did bikram yoga yesterday. For the 2% of you who know even lesss about the cool new activities on the block nowadays, this is 90 minute long yoga, done in 26 positions each done twice, in a room of about 100 F and 40% humidity. My amiga here in Berlin, Cecile, who is in love with this stuff and has been doing it two years, got me and two others to go with her.
That is some hot, challenging, all around intense activity my friends. You sweat buckets, and you feel like the least flexible thing since a carrot stick. I could barely keep it together. I wasn't even able to do all 26 positions, because on the last one done standing up, I almost fainted. By the end I was just aching for a chance to leave. It was very healthful, though, I felt. Done 3 or 4 times a week, I think this would be good for almost anyone, but it definitely requires a while to get used to. I have a 10 day pass, so I'll go some more, but it's expensive, so I'm not sure I'll stick with it in the immediate future...

But that's in spite of the fact that I'm a rich, rich man now. I have an internship! I like to call it a tiny, job, but at any rate I started it on Wednesday, but have my first real work day tomorrow at 9:00 AM. Basically I read policy position papers and do corrections, further research, fact-checking if need be, and then let the pros decide. It's a give away internship from the Max Planck Institute, but my entire time here in Berlin I've been thinking I should get an internship and have a little proper experience to go along with my studies, and now I got it, baby. One of the more ironic aspects of this job, and there are many, seeing as how I basically wandered into it, is that they pay me! I was all set to have an unpaid internship, but as things stand, I get 7.5 an hour, which while no great, is disturbingly the best paid internship I've yet found in any of my acquaintance here, German or foreign. It's 10 hours a week.
What makes the situation a bit funnier, is that with this 300 Euros a month added to my 750 a month in fellowship, I make exactly enough to exceed poverty income for a single individual in Germany. Not bad, right? Of course, my all-together-now income of the year in Euros looks like it will top out pretty low, but given that I'm neither taxed nor forced to pay for health insurance, nor for that matter forced to purchase all travel costs, I guess it can argued my income's a bit higher. But whatever. I'm richer than Solomon over here, watch out.

In my ongoing epic tale of journeys, I'm also leaving Berlin yet again, and for the last time in the foreseeable future, from April 6 - 11. This time, I will be going to Austria. Presently my group of Austrian friends laugh at me every time this is mentioned, because it's so ridiculous that I'm going to middle of nowhere upper- Austria. Of course, to me it sounds great, but they promise that I will be astounded by the fierceness of the accent. Or, as Daniel said specifically (his English is quite good; year in Nebraska): "Dude, you'll be, like, the first American there since the occupation."
The actual genesis for the trip was that Xandi's (Alexandra) mother is having a birthday, so she and her boyfriend Marcus are traveling down to visit for five days. They asked if I wanted to come, and of course I jumped on the offer. I have been promised many days of walks in the woods, followed by nights of Austrian revelry.
Truth be told, though, I think this will be my last trip for a while. As much as I love my Austrians, I really do need to sit myself down in Berlin for more than a week or two. It's good to get out, and I don't regret any of my trips, but traveling where's you out, you know?

So now to other things. Thanks for staying tuned in everyone. Till soon!

The islitas

2011-03-04T00:42:00.000-08:00

Oh man. Seeing the Canaries, baby. Today my cold seems to be all but gone, but in the mean time there's been lots of seeing the island here, Tenerife. The weather has not been over the top warm, more like 60 or 65 degrees, but a great departure from freezing Berlin. Yesterday we circumnavigated the island, which was interesting because it has some really different climate zones. It's almost desert for long stretches, but outside the rain shadow of the mountain it's almost tropical, and it the hills there are pine forests. It's been striking.

Tonight there's the ferry ride to Lanzarote, though, which is the less populated, more arid island to the northwest. It's a long ferry ride, but the idea is to sleep overnight on it. We'll see how well that goes. Short posts, I know, but I'm on vacation, right? Best people.

Heyo

2011-03-01T23:35:00.000-08:00

Hey all!

So many adventures. Right now I'm at my hotel in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the largest island in the Canary Islands, which make up a province of Spain just off the coast of Africa, and are consequently much warmer and than Berlin at the moment (20 as opposed to 0 degrees Celcius, which is like the difference between 32 and 70 in Fahrenheit). I was in Greece just 72 hours ago, or so, but sadly didn't have a computer at the time. I'll try and be better about this trip, which will be the last for little while, I think. One can only travel so much before your own room starts to look like the best vacation there is.

I spent about nine hours in Madrid before changing plans to Santa Cruz, and it was a real bit of luck that Pierre, a French amigo from Almería days happened to be visiting a friend of his that very week in Madrid. Torry bussed in from León, so it was almost like a reunion night in Madrid.

The flight to Tenerife was at 6:00, though, so adding to getting to the airport early meant that there was only time for about 90 minutes of napping on the tile floor before it was time to board the flight. That would have been bad enough had I not had my head cold, but obviously vacations and colds don't coordinate.

Now Torry and I have a car, a hotel room, and plans to climb a mountain. Till soon!

I return!

2011-02-15T12:12:00.000-08:00

Okay everyone, I've been AWOL for some time now, and believe it or not I have been writing posts, I just haven't been finishing them and putting them online! I somehow lost steam while stateside, and now I've really decided that I need to make a post and get myself back into the rhythm of putting anecdotes online for you all to read. I'm just going to seemlessly reintegrate myself into this process by beginning a small post on... traveling! Yes, I will be traveling indeed, in the coming weeks and months. Plans are afoot to go to, yes it's extravagant, Greece, Spain and Austria. Some details of what will be seen need to ironed out, but I'm really getting a move on in the travel department.

I also had a small job interview today, and I do mean small, at only 40 hours a weeks it's part of a part-time position, but I think it went well. I saw a flyer for a job as a student assistant at an EU population research and public policy institution called Population Europe, specially requesting English proficient applicants, and I sent in my CV, transcript and a cover letter. When I arrived I spent about 20 minutes with three administrators who told me that Population Europe was not just a research organization, it was also a sub-department of the Max-Plank-Institut, which is a well-known and highly respected Social Science body here in Berlin. They specifically told me that while this job is indeed paid, they realized it was for the Social Capital and resume building experience that applicants showed interest. I neglected to tell them I was humorously unaware of that their cachet floweth over. I did trim the edges of beard, though, in a gesture towards professional grooming, so some good will have come of this regardless.

I'm trying to think of a good anecdote about Germany to show how goodly I am at observing and experiencing this culture into which I have moved myself... Ah yes, I can mention closing times. This is a small thing, but one that continues to trip me up. Germans, despite their well earned reputation for efficiency, seem not at all to be interested in consistent and uniform business hours. I feel like in the US, everything is open from 9:00 - 5:00 unless explicitly otherwise or with a long history and starkly logical explanation for being otherwise. Grocery stores are open 24 hours a day; maybe unnecessary, but regularized. Cafés open at 6:00 or 5:00 to catch an early crowd. There's some rhyme and reason to it. Not the Germans.

No, the Germans are not regular in their operating times, and seemingly interconnected institutions are not coordinated. An example was my paying my student fees today. My university's major office hours are 9:00 -4:00. However, the international students department's hours are:

Montag 11 - 15 Uhr
Dienstag 11 - 15 Uhr
Mittwoch 13 - 17 Uhr
Donnerstag 14 - 17 Uhr
Freitag 10 - 13 Uhr

In addition to this brief lesson in the days of the week in German, note that only two of five days have the same opening hours, and that on Friday the office is open for only three hours. At any rate, I went to the international students' office to ask if DAAD scholars receive a deduction in their school fees as scholarship holders. I arrived at the office at 1:30ish, and found out that the school's cashier, who takes any monetary transactions, closes at 1:00. So I went to the bank to make a transfer, but my bank closed its cash transactions at 2:00, and I was there late. Note that the bank is open until 5:00, but only for speaking with the agents, not for doing cash transactions. So, I went to another of my banks that was open until 5:00, and they generously did let me transfer my 220 Euros into my university's account. So all's well that ends well.

And, I stress, I'm not complaining. On one level, this is Germany and the Germans can do things however they want. Furthermore, the Germans have a well functioning society, so clearly this isn't too big an issue for them, and indeed I'm sure that business operating hours here seem much more logical to them, or rather the lack of regularity seems unsurprising. I was simply struck at the diversity of opening hours today, that's all. This is also not to be confused with Spain, who opening hours I also commented on at length, but at least here the hours are posted, obeyed, and fairly stable, if non-uniform.

It's good to say hi to everyone! Hope you're all well! Best from Deutschland.

Observation

2010-12-07T09:35:00.000-08:00

So, any comments at all would be appreciated on this post, but I thought I would make an observation about some of my courses here that I think is pretty interesting. Obviously I spent four years as a BA student, so I feel pretty knowledgeable about that, but my courses here are all Masters courses, with the exception of one which is PhD students. Naturally I spent some time with MAs and PhDs while in Seattle, but now that I'm enrolled as a graduate student, it's been interesting to observe the community differences. Besides, it's not just my classes, but all sorts of academic and leisure meetings that throw you into contact with lots of other grad students.

And there are community differences! MAs, to be crude, seem to fall into the two general categories of "committed" and "partial" enthusiasms. That is to say, a lot of them are really interested in the subject matter and are thoughtful and invested students. Others, however, seem to have their energies in life committed to all sorts of other things, but generally have full and distracting lives outside their discipline. What all these students have in common, though, is a really strong sense of community that I think is really reminiscent of of undergrad. There are parties and a sort of unity against a lecturer, for instance. Really, the MA student atmosphere as best as I can see so far seems to be "just keep doing what you did as a BA, but you do actually have to opinions and research now."

What really motivated me to post this subject, though, has been my interactions with PhD students in class and in gatherings. Unless I'm much mistaken, things change a great deal once you move into a doctorate program. First of all, a certain degree of neurosis seems to be obligatory, since most PhD students seem to be a little off kilter, maybe even maladjusted. But what I really notice is the skepticism, the real sizing up that happens between PhDs. The community between MAs isn't necessarily gone, but it's problematized. Personal competition enters into the situation now, and until a doc student knows your name, you institution and program, and your research, you are a bit of a scary unknown. There really seems to be this strong pressure to be sort of clear up immediately: 1) is this guy's field close enough to mine that I need to be thoughtful about it, and consequently 2) is this guy a scrub low-level researcher, on my level, or a high-flyer/published all over/well-known advisor/sexier-research-than-mine jerk. The strength of the sizing up is impressive. Of course, as an MA student I am still fairly dismissible, but the bizarre social rituals of the Western Grad Student are strange indeed. Seriously, you're at some University Meet and Greet kind of gathering, saddle up to the table to collect your glass of warm wine and oxidizing cheese on bread, and find yourself in a knot of unknowns. You say your studying "Political Science, specifically Migration Politics" and you can tell who the other Social Science student is, because he or she will be the one with the significant seeming gaze.

Not exactly the Siren Song of academia...

Otherwise, though, things are going alright here in Berlin. The weather has taken a turn for the warmer, so we're hovering around 30 degrees, with occasional ventures above freezing during the day. I actually kind of like the cold; it makes my daily walk more interesting. It really isn't winter until the first breath outside feels like little needles in your lungs. My Austrians look at skeptically when I say my coat is okay, but it really is so far. It's a pea coat, a pea jacket almost, since it's about half-thigh length, but it's all wool and just warm as can be. It's really just my lower body that gets chilly if I'm not walking briskly, but wool pants are not on my horizon, I don't think. Not cold enough for that, for sure.

My room also continues to be a pretty pathetic place, I realize. I should just buy a frame for the mattress in my room, get a few posters, and just make the room seem more livable, since at the moment it's really transient looking. The furniture was good, but I should have continued that momentum and gotten the whole place set up. Now I'm out of oomph to get it done.

But soon I'll be state-side for a few weeks anyway. The visit to Mom happens on the 17th, and I am officially flying to Denver for three days towards to end of my visit to see Julia, so there will be a bit of domestic traveling while I'm home for the holidays. I think I'll have my phone working too, so I may just speak to amigos while back. Till soon, and best from Germany people.

Thanksgiving past!

2010-11-29T04:42:00.000-08:00

So the main story of my weekend was making Thanksgiving happen. I celebrated on Saturday, but it really was a big operation to put together, and almost nothing else happened. Friday is my busiest day of the week, so between courses I ran home, picked up the 7.2 kilos (16 lbs.) turkey and put it in the fridge. Then I had to go back to school and attend another course. The commute isn't that bad, about 40 minutes, but making the trip to and from twice in one day is a bit frustrating. But I got home at 7:00 PM, and the cooking began...

The menu was, I thought, tolerable but ambitious. The turkey was the big deal, but thinking of things that can be made in large quantities and still be authentic and tasty were mashed potatoes and cornbread, plus pie. I got a loaf of bread for stuffing and green beans for sauteing. I told people who were coming to bring wine or beer, since I wasn't going to be buying it for 10+ people. I thought, if I make the pies Friday night, than Saturday morning I can get the other stuff done. Doable, right?

Right. I was in over my head, I have to say. It took a lot longer to make the pies than I thought. I can make the crust pretty easily, I've done enough pies in my life, but making three pies (two pumpkin, one apple) was just more work than I anticipated. Also, I had to cook the pumpkin (no canned stuff here), so by the time I had made the crusts and cooked the pumpkin I was just so tired. I figured I could finish in the morning. There was help coming, after all.

Two different invitees, Kaitlin and Carolina, offered to come by Saturday morning and help make the food. I gratefully told them to come, three people can crank out a Thanksgiving dinner in five hours, right? Abandonment. Kaitlin messaged me to say she woke up with a fever that is plaguing her office. Carolina just baldly said she was behind in her work and would be late. Doing the final planning Friday night revealed that if we wanted to eat at 2:00 (my plan) then the turkey would have to go into the oven at 10:00! But wait, I have to bake the pies for an hour! But wait, I still have to peel the apples! But wait, I'm going to need to at least vacuum this apartment, right?... ... ... Ah crap, this is going to be bad.

So I got up at 6:15. Got the pies ready as soon as I could, but I'd made a few miscalculations. I didn't get enough evaporated milk, so I had to run to the store and get more. Finally, pies prepared, I threw them in the over at 9:30ish. Problem: pies take longer to bake if there are multiples ones in the oven. It took about 1.5 hours, so they didn't even come out until 11:00. I'd prepped the turkey meanwhile, making the stuffing and washing the bird and cutting off the neck (harder than anticipated). The pies came out, the fowl went in.

Then there was gravy to make and I had to eat something. I really did have to choke down some bread - I just wasn't hungry. Too much caffeine and anxiousness. I picked up all the furniture in my room and put it against the wall, then vacuumed and moved all the tables and chairs into my room so it could fit twelvish people. Then, of course, people started to arrive, and I chatted and so forth a bit, but mostly I just peeled potatoes and cut onion and washed beans and so forth. People were helpful, though, and it all came together around 3:30 or 4:00. Late, obviously, but everything turned out very good or good. The turkey was a little dry, the beans weren't so flavorful, but it was a very authentic American Thanksgiving.

And it was about 12 people that came. We spent the rest of the evening eating and talking till about 1:00 AM. It was quite international. Three Italians, four Americans, two Germans, two Austrians. One Frenchwoman. Plus me. Much wine was drunk and pumpkin pie was pushed upon highly, highly skeptical Europeans. It found little love. There was some enjoyment, a lot of toleration, and some strong rejection - but it was good! I made good pumpkin pie, and I'm still eating it.

I have, though, found the key to impressing Europeans: corn bread. It is not an exaggeration to say that they freaked out! I served it warm, putting it in right after the turkey came out, and they really could just barely keep it together. I do really think they enjoyed the other foods, but the real emotion they had in saying the cornbread was delicious was impressive. It wasn't even super indulgent corn bread! It was sweetened, but not super sweet. It didn't have lots of butter or other obvious added tasty things. It was just fresh bread!

After everyone left I threw it all is the fridge and collapsed into my dirty dished filled room, with just enough chairs pushed against the walls to fit a mattress on the ground. The next morning it took a good three hours or so to clean all the dishes, right all the furniture, and clean the surfaces and floors. Not as long as I thought it might...

So, yes, I think I know what you're thinking, and it's true, that was way, way too much work. Honestly, I just got in over my head. I invited more people that I expected, started too late on the cooking, and didn't quite have planned out how to coordinate the process. It really wasn't that expensive, though. I did good cost comparison ahead of time. I also managed to not screw anything up really. Nothing burned or wasn't tasty, even if it wasn't absolutely optimal. I would do such a thing again, but I would get iron-clad guarantees of kitchen assistance.

So that was Thanksgiving. Yay!

Thanksgiving

2010-11-21T13:10:00.000-08:00

Have I mentioned my Thanksgiving plans? Last year Thanksgiving was turkey-less, because as an American I didn't realize that turkeys can be hard to get a hold of in other parts of the world. In Spain, I went in to a butcher at about ten days from the date and asked about getting a turkey and he said that in order to get a whole turkey they'd have to order it especially, and two weeks in advance. I had a chicken instead, since it was too late regardless.

I went in about three weeks early, meaning two weeks ago, to a butcher down the street and asked about a turkey. They gave me the same story, but I was in time. This continent doesn't seem to be as turkey-crazy as I am accustomed. In my neighborhood run-of-the-mill grocery supermarket you can buy a whole chicken, duck or goose, but no turkey. I'll leave it at that.

I invited six people to my place for Thanksgiving. I thought it would be nice not only to have a larger number of people here to celebrate with, but also to just have new friends over and give them a little american exoticism. Two weren't sure they could come, so I invited two more, plus two Americans I thought might enjoy the meal. Then the original two wafflers changed their mind, so now I have ten guests coming! One Italian (Stefano, who helped me move), three Austrians (met by chance looking at the same apartment), one Ukranian (also a scholarship fellow), two Germans (roommate, and a girlfriend of an above), and three Americans. How international, right?

I'm not stressed per se, just a but worried. I've roasted birds five to ten times, but I'm no expert, and a turkey is big (I got a 15 lbs. bird). The pies I've made often, but I'll want to do it in advance just to be unstressed on the day. Luckily I've actually made a pie from a pumpkin before, since it was a bit difficult to figure out at first. It's really not as time consuming as it sounds even - it doesn't take long to make a pie if you've done it often enough, but ten people will be coming over to experience Thanksgiving! They better be thankful.

What makes it even a little better is that the celebration will be in my bedroom. Good thing I have so little furniture. I'll just move it all to one wall and put two tables together. I think it will go okay, but I'm looking forward to having a Thanksgiving in general.

Hope all's well back home amigos!

Leftism in universities

2010-11-17T12:33:00.001-08:00

I remember a smaller interaction I had about a month before going to UW. That would have been right about August 2005. Some repairman was over at my sister's house, doing some sort of work I didn't see, because I met him in the driveway as I walked up to the front door. I just sort of said hello and mentioned that I was the owner's sister and just amiably started some conversation with a guy putting his tools away. He asked me about school, and I mentioned I was about to start at UW, and he became really serious and told me about liberal universities, brainwashing, I had to be careful, some sort of "student bill of rights" out there, and generally that I was going somewhere very dangerous. I wasn't so much surprised as weirded out, so I excused myself and didn't think much of the strange electrician or whatever.

Of course, it didn't take too long before being in college really caught me up on what the sort of political fault line the guy was introducing me to. Colleges are so often perceived to be these bastions of insular liberal institutions where barely reformed Marxists pervert good American kids into freedom hating hippies. And of course, it's true that on the whole universities are unusually progressive places, but the whole debate never really bothered me that me. That is to say, I never really felt that one had to be in a university to be intellectually worthwhile or anything but ignorant, nor did one have to leave a university to get "real life" perspective or have genuine, rather than imagine and abstract, influence on the world. The whole debate was just one of those issues that never made sense to me, where I couldn't get worked up about it.

This brings us to why I'm making this post now from Germany. I have a very nice, thoughtful professor who I don't dislike really, but she's totally a barely reformed Marxist, patriotism hating leftist almost-loony. One of the texts she gave to me was written by Wendy Brown, who is a Political Science professor at UC Berkeley - and I can only hope she was given her position based on entirely different work than the article I just read. I'm a pretty solidly progressive individual here, but I guess I managed to get through a Social Science BA without realizing that there are professors who argue on state pay that anyone who isn't a member of a union undermines democracy and the government is organized to funnel money from individuals to politicians and cronies. Jesus! I mean, yes, unions are a reaction to workers getting a raw deal, and yes some institutions in society are helpful to already wealthy people become more so - but this seems borderline delusional.

I don't want to rant, but I think this comes largely from being in Europe. I think I might be the most economically, socially and culturally conservative person in that room every week. We had a discussion about how attempts by companies to build team mentalities is a tool to squeeze more productivity out of each worker by creating the impression of a community and making people more satisfied at work. It's true, but I made the point that can't we say it's not all bad? Even if people work harder for no increased income, isn't there at least the benefit of being happier. Reaction: row of shaking European heads. Poor, delusional American.

But what's your point Matthew? You may be asking. Good question. I'm not so sure. I don't know that I have a moral of the story, and certainly not a solution, but I can make this summation: Universities are indeed liberal. They're not that bad, though. Some people in them are bat-shit crazy extreme.

In other news I cooking an entire Thanksgiving dinner for me and 5-8 friends. They have agreed to help, but it will be an adventure. Till next!

Tea, and coffee

2010-11-11T11:21:00.000-08:00

Man, bread with cheese and a pot of hot tea is the best thing when it's cold out. And it's cold out, 37 degrees, but I was so happy with my dinner when I got home. It's just so funny how diverse the bread really is. There's Weizen - wheat, Roggen - rye, Dinkel - spelt as the main cereals, but you can get loaves that are pure, or just an endless ratio of mixes. Often potato, barley, or oat flour is added too. After that, you can get a fluffy light loaf, a fluffy dense loaf, or a rigid hard loaf. So really, there's just so much out there, and it's so utterly available. Bakeries are all over the place, and they're cheap. A one pound loaf is about 1.50 Euros. The good cheese may be a bit more of an adventure to find, but it's really not a challenge.

And my tea consumption, which has never been low by American standards, hasn't been stable the last five years. There were months there where I drank a lot, but coffee has always been the sexier, potent stimulant. But tea is so nice, because it keeps you so warm and doesn't make you jittery if you drink a quart of it. I've been making one or two pots a day. It helps that Germans are really into tea, so somehow it seems like less work to make it, though I realize that's probably mostly psychological.

Although mentioning tea and Germany does bring up an interesting point about German culture: respect for herbs. Obviously up to 100 years ago people in the Western world still had the strong connection to herbal remedies and were more knowledgable about the nature around them, at least rural people. Maybe because Americans are so prone to moving and because we've been around the continent less we just don't have the background of encyclopedic knowledge about plants and medicinal treatments. Maybe we jumped on the modern medicine bandwagon sooner; I don't know.

But the natural treatment movement that's so resurgent now in the States I don't think ever died away as much here. If you go to any grocery store the number of herbal teas is really impressive. Maybe even more striking to me is how much space they take up in pharmacies. They sell specialty pharmacy strength herbal teas with warnings about how often to consume the stuff. And the best part is herbal liquor. Traditionally herbal liquors like gin (which is just grain alcohol with juniper berry flavor, so berry vodka, actually) and Jägermeister (which is a mix of many herbs, and means "Master of the Hunt" for those who care) were not just a way for people to enjoy a drink but were ways to store healthy herbs!

I think when I first heard that in Germany when I was 16, I just thought it was ignorant or old-timey self-delusion to think that you would drink schnapps or herbal liquor for your health, but it does make some sense. Unlike nowadays where they make flavored liquor through adding flavoring concentrates to grain alcohol, in the old days they actually had to let rose hips, mint, thyme, lemon peel and other flavorers sit in the alcohol for months. They'd make it in the spring, and drink it in the winter. The drink actually had lemon in it, so it probably had some real beneficial compounds in it. That's why there's this lingering idea here that you should have a shot of strong herbal liquor if you're feeling sick. Obviously not go a' drinkin' or anything, but take a tea concentrate, essentially. I'm sure there's nowhere to buy that sort of thing now, but it would interesting to make it some year...

In other news I'm sore as can be. I went to the gym the day before yesterday, worked out for about two hours, and left thinking that I had done just about the right amount of work to be satisfied but not horribly sore, thus discouraging myself from going in the future. I was wrong. Just putting on a jacket makes me wince. Oh well, a sign of improvement, I suppose.

Learn anything about bread and schnapps? Hope so! Best.

I remember...

2010-11-09T12:57:00.001-08:00

This one time in Maine, my mother watched me eat a big bowl of pasta, and then go back for more, and she said more or less "it's refreshing to see someone who eats a lot." Obviously I'm 24 and pretty physically active, and I suppose I eat about 75% lean meat/eggs and veggies, but at any rate I haven't fallen into the weight watching attitude that affects pretty much everyone else I happen to know, though some are better at pretending they don't than others. Middle-age will probably fix all this.

But still, a great example of my mentality struck me today. I just had supper, and I was reaching for a yogurt in the fridge when I suddenly wondered what was in it. I always look at the ingredients before I buy food, but I was curious about the nutrition. There wasn't much in the way of vitamins or minerals (German labels don't list them), but 932 kj in the serving. I instinctively assumed that the "k" was for "Kalorienen" - calories. 932 calories in a 9 oz cup of yogurt! Jesus, that's huge! That's like a hamburger! ... ... ... Wow, this yogurt is going to be awesome! I was excited for that split moment, than I realized that kj means "kilojules" and there are only about 220 calories in the thing. My dream crashed about me. It was still tasty though.

Otherwise the food situation here has been fine, but less spunky than last year in Spain, I have to admit. My egg consumption is still hovering at about 12 a week, and the lack of vegetables in season is a challenge. The only saving grace is the bread here, which I swear is so dense and grainy that it feels like a vegetable anyway. Of course you can buy white bread or fluffy bread as well, it's not as if they don't have it, but that really good dense, almost black Germany bread with the kernels of unground grain still in it is just so tasty. I try to buy good cheese and have it for breakfast or dinner, but I admit that in the mornings sometimes I just have coffee and skip the bread, and it's so cold here by nightfall that I want something cooked. Speaking of which, I'm going to get a wool coat soon, I think. My jackets just won't cut it much longer.

I also made Sammy, my housemate, laugh pretty hard today. We went to the gym together, and when I found out that they have disinfectant swabs to use after one gets off the equipment, I just had to mention that it was highly German. When he asked why, I told him that Germans are always considerate and never polite. He got it almost immediately and chuckled, but asked me to explain. I told him that a Germans don't yell in public, or stand in doorways, or talk on buses. They're way more likely to pick up their dropped receipts or garbage on the street, or find a napkin to clean up coffee spilled on the supermarket floor. They just have a profound respect for common space. But people are so direct here, they just ask for things they want, demand that people get out of the way, complain unpolitically to someone about their establishment. Usually not arrogantly, not unnecessarily, just without any extra politeness.

Americans other the other hand, I generalized, are super polite but much less considerate. No one would use "it's a free country" to get out of something here. If someone's chatting in the doorway of a store and you can't get in, the average American might say "excuse me, can I get by?" The average German might just say "don't stand in doorways!" and just push past. People become indignant when you're the one guy not being thoughtful about everyone else, you are free game for abuse. That's why there are swabs in the gym, because it's not yours, so it better be the exact same as when you found it, bacteria included.

Okay, that's a enough for now. Best from Berlin all!

Boring blues concert and helping Daniel move

2010-11-04T16:05:00.000-07:00

Brief everyday adventures of the evening: helping Daniel Wöger move, and seeing a blues concert.

Daniel Wöger is the Austria I met while rejecting an apartment. He's recently found one, though, near Wernauer Straße, which is a super hip part of Berlin. He blitzed people today by phone and by e-mail, though, to help him move into his new place with beer as a reward. Although not in a very beer-ish mood, I'd been in the apartment all day reading, so I took the metro up to his new place and hauled unassembled furniture through a courtyard and up two flights to his small room.

Can anyone tell me who has lived in cities with with many high rises - do people pay more for rooms in the back? Here, there are Vorhäuser and Gartenhäuser. The first means that it's the part of the room that faces the street, whereas the back part faces into the central courtyard, and because it's much quieter, people tend to want to recessed rooms more. My apartment building is long and skinny, so it doens't have the distinction (but we're in a cul-de-sac, sit it's still super, super quiet here).

Then Daniel and I just drank a beer while he rolled and smoked a bunch of cigarettes. It was nice and all, but I'm a bit tired for reasons that are not entirely clear, and so was he, so we just called it a night. Daniel is somewhat hilariously Germanic looking, though. He's taller than me, at least 6' 4", but skinnier. He has kind of a big, bearish head, and long hair. It makes him look pretty baby Viking. He's nice, though, so I'm sure I'll see him around more.

On the way home I stopped for about an hour at a blues club. Another American told me to make a stop, and since it was on the way home I came by to say hi. I don't want to stereotype Germans too much, but I'll just use that as a segue to doing so by saying that I don't think Germans were meant for the blues. Of course, the lyrics weren't said very clearly, but that's just a language issue. The playing was really precise, and it's not until you hear a band that seems to have no groove at all that you realize how loose bands actually play. Not improvisational, say, but just a little fast and sloppy, but kind of instinctually pleasantly so. Leave it to the Germans to be too precise. As said before, though, I was tired - home I went.

And, highly German-ly, I had a nice dinner of bread with cheese and sauerkraut. Best all!

On the agenda today

2010-11-04T02:31:00.000-07:00

Make dentist and optometrist appointments. Now that I am blissfully swaddled in the womb of the German nanny state, I'm going to get my eyes and teeth inspected and improved. Actually, though, I have to wait four months before I'm allowed to spend insurance money on eye related hardware, but I can still get a prescription and so forth. If it's not too expensive, maybe I'll just get some glasses right away. Luckily Sammy (the roommate) has a dentist around the corner he's been going to since he was a kid, so I'll see if I can get an appointment there. I actually haven't been to a dentist since about June of 09, which means I'm at like 16 months. How middle-classedly irresponsible of me.

Also, Dr. Atkins would be proud of me, since last night I made burger onion pie. I didn't realize until after I made it that that dish is a protein bomb, but really not very unhealthy. There's almost no added fat involved, just beef, egg, onion and crust. I also realized anew how national dishes are really just superficially tweaked versions of international dishes. A burger, or burger onion pie, or regular pie, or a stack of fluffy pancakes are all American dishes, but they're basically the same all over the world. A burger here is a fricadella, which is the same without a bun and with more seasoning. Burger onion pie is just quiche with ground beef, which I'm sure some Frenchman makes all the time without knowing its an American national dish. Regular pie is just an oversized fruit tart. Basically, I have no food allegiance, I suppose; it's much more all the same than it seems. Except pasta. Man pasta is delicious.

More later. Coffee now.

2010-10-28T14:31:00.000-07:00

Hey all,

Thought I post an update, since it's been a week since the last one. I actually did type up a whole entry, but that computer issues deleted it and it took me a few days to overcome the mild disappointment.

But yes, life continues apace in Berlin. It's gloves and scarf weather, no doubt, and I never go out without the both of them now. It's been crisp but dry, so I've no complaints about the weather whatsoever. I may need to get a warmer winter coat, though. I'm a bit ashamed to say it, but I didn't come as well prepared as I thought. I was foolish, and arrogant, these last fews years. Like anyone who's lived outside a mild climate, I make fun of Western Washingtonians for having no idea what snow and cold are like. Sure they're not used to it and it's not their fauly, but that doesn't prevent a Spokanite from pathetically trying to make up for coming from an economically depressed region by saying that at least we can drive in the snow. But I've been arrogant, because I also enjoy Seattle, so I have my cake and eat it too. Sure I can handle the cold and snow, but if I must live in this exceedingly lovable city where the streets are always clear, I'll do it. I've lost it, though. I'm a wuss now. It's cold here baby, it's cold. Well, 40 or 45 degrees, but it's going to get colder, and my Columbia doesn't hack it. I only brought the liner! Can you believe it? I'm so used to putting a synthetic cover over a sweater that I totally forgot that the liner is pretty essential. I won't get anything expensive, but it's the shame that gets me...

Otherwise, I've been eating a lot of marzipan. I have to after lunch or dinner, or whenever I have coffee. It's delicious man! Almond and sugar paste, where can you go wrong? Additionally, my cabbage consumption has gotten out of control. I eat the kraut, but I sauté it too. My diet has become Germanized, to say the least. While I continue to my tortillas, I'm doing well with bread, eggs, onions and potatoes. I should make a stew, though, that would be good... I can certainly get all the bones and ham hocks I need - the things are all over the place in a grocery store here.

Okay, off to bed. Best all.

Oh! And Another Thing!

2010-10-20T11:26:00.000-07:00

I didn't realize it last time I was in Germany, but it's taken me about a month to say with confidence: German beer is not as good as Northwest beer. Seriously. On average, German beer is way better than average American beer, better than Coors or Budweiser or Miller, that's for sure. But better than Deschutes? Better than Rogue? Better than Hales or Sierra Nevada? No my friend. No. Of course, they cost 40 - 60 cents a bottle here, but I don't see the craft brewing here. As I tell foreigners and Americans alike that I meet here, the Northwest isn't the most powerful, populous or richest part of the US, but it's definitely the prettiest, and probably the best to live in. Obviously that's just a bit of half-joking regionalism coming out, but seriously, we have the best beer and coffee in the world. I haven't been able to find any evidence to the contrary. Anywhere.

Hi all

2010-10-20T10:34:00.001-07:00

Just been moving right along here in Berlin, without a huge amount to report. I did get drinks a few nights ago with Stefano, an Italian I met just waiting in line at the university a three weeks ago. We ran into each other completely by accident at the university again, and got a very boring lunch at the "mensa," or cafeteria in German. At any rate, he's studying at Humboldt as well, though literature. He's certainly a nice guy, though, and it was a good time to talk about culture in general as well as Berlin and fairly random stories of the sort new acquaintances make.

But, my knowing Stefano immediately became great, because I've needed furniture for a while. Though Sammy generously gave me his old mattress and a chair, that's really not much to put in a room. I found someone selling a desk, another chair, side table, and sideboard online. After some pitiful haggling I got her to sell it for 30 Euros, and then 40 when she through in another chair and a small dinner table. All these things disassembled, and I planned to rent a car for a few hours and just move the stuff across town. Bad assumption. Unlike Spain, Germans, evidently, require a European driver's license. Maybe tourists can get though this if they get a higher priced car for a longer period of time, but there are hourly rentals here catering to urbanites, and I was out of luck. None of my roommates were there to help, so I called the pitiful number of people I know here, including Stefano, who called right back and said he'd get his car and of course help me move!

It went smoothly, and I was predictably grateful. Sadly, I was sold a bit of a lemon regarding the sideboard. The other things all went together fine, but the woman selling the stuff to me admitted she'd bought them new from someone who didn't have the instructions to give her, so I was at least the third person to assemble them. Nothing quite fit together right, well tightly I mean. The pieces were all there, but screws were loose and it was wobbly. When I put a little weight on the thing, a few screws popped out entirely and the thing collapsed. I can probably screw it together again, but it will never be disassembled and then reassembled. Ah well. 40 bucks really isn't the end of the world.

A discerning reader might also say, "hey, Matt, you have a research and study grant in Germany, you seem to be doing very little related to those activities." And right you would be. Completely by chance all the classes I had an interest in fell on Monday and Friday, thus making the most disruptive schedule possible for someone who's only scheduled for two days. Monday was canceled for the entire department due to orientations. None of the orientation modules were pertinent to me, so I had nothing to do. Friday as yet to come, but when it does it will be a month and a day since my arrival.

I do not feel like I've been here a month. I've been here a week or so by my internal clock. It took me a month to get sick twice, find a room, furnish it, register with the city, register with the university and clarify my academic situation. I guess I did go to Bonn for two days as well. I feel like that's not so great a record. Well, now's the time to start, right? My research should be pretty easy to get moving on. I've got to contact a few organizations and do some preliminary reading, and I have to feeling the amount of information for me to process will explode out of control and it will be a challenge just to corral it into something manageable.

Other interesting anecdote? I made tortillas today. I feel a little foolish, since Germany has such good bread to offer, but I admit that I miss my bean burritos, and salsa. There's lots of good food in the states, naturally, but salsa and tortillas are just so tragically absent in my life right now. I think the tortillas weren't that good, actually. But who makes anything perfect the first time? They weren't pliable enough, and I think I both overcooked them and used too little shortening. I can see them being something a practiced person can just crank out in quick time. We'll see if I get the right practice. Even though flour, shortening, water and salt make tortillas unbeatably cheap to make, I already have bakeries everywhere to provide me with great bread.

I'll cut off this post before it gets too massive. Best from Berlin all!

Back!

2010-10-13T12:41:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone, back on the radar here. I've been really busy and distracted the last… week really, so it's taken me a while to get it together, hence the lack of any recent posting. The overriding reason for that was my illness. That's right, I was sick again. The migraine was just the beginning of a five day suffering fest that I'm pretty sure was an intestinal infection, complete with all the normal symptoms of that sickness. A complete description of the discomfort would be bad form, I think (ever notice how much people can't help talking about it when they're sick? I suppose I'm no exception), but it was amplified by the fact that I was underway in a train when started to know for sure I wasn't well. This past weekend was my fellowship orientation in Bonn, which is a five hour train ride away. I got up at 5:00 to get to the train station in time (I was early, as always), and it was only about 20 minutes out when the train came to halt. By this time I was already feeling pretty bad. At any rate, someone had sprung in front of the high speed train I was on to commit suicide. This is a fairly common way to commit suicide in Germany, for whatever reason, and after a brief murmur passengers and crew settled down about the whole thing. The brief stopping of the train did disrupt the clockwork synchronization of the German train scheduling, though, and so our train couldn't continue after the next station. We had to disembark and shoehorn ourselves onto a regional train to make the same trek. This means I got to the orientation about three and a half hours later than intended. I missed a few fairly important sections of the orientation, besides being just spectacularly uncomfortable the entire time. Other than a chance to inform of us the fellows about Germany and our awards, though, the orientation is a chance for us to network, which was another aspect of the meeting I really couldn't make the best of. I was withdrawn and went to bed as early as possible just because I felt so awful. The ride home was fairly uneventful, except that I left my ticket on the seat next to me when I finally arrived in Berlin and went home. We were specifically informed that the original ticket is needed to be reimbursed for traveling expenses. I will pathetically plead my case, but I may end up having paid a fairly high sum to have traveled while sick to a meeting I wasn't able to make much of. In light of feeling so much better today, though, that all seems so acceptable. Everything seems nice enough when you're coming off an illness, I suppose.

The weather here is also getting quite crisp, and it is really nice. It's scarf and glove weather, always a jacket, and definitely a sweater under that in the mornings or evenings. Does anyone else just feel cleaner and brighter and perkier in general when it's just a bit nippy? Especially the clean part; things just feel cleaner when it's cold. Filthy sidewalks aren't so bad when it's cold out, somehow. When it's hot I feel like I get a layer of city all over me throughout the day, but when it's Autumn everything's self-contained. I've spent the last five Falls in Seattle, Italy and Spain, so the last nippy October I had was senior year of high school. I clearly was designed for this type of weather, maybe even instinctively, if I may be so arrogantly bold. Like when you step outside the front door and it's just slightly too cold for what you're wearing, and it's perfect because in about five minutes of walking you'll warm up and it will be just right. Maybe I'll be like aunt Jen and retire to a northern city like Chicago…

I also found out pretty securely that there will be no MA for me over the next two years. The admissions man for the MA that would conceivably grant me an MA given my qualifications told me (per e-mail) that I could apply for the upcoming year like everyone else. I can't really blame them for doing this to me, I'm really spectacularly down to the last minute and have almost nothing to stand on in asking for an exception. That does put me in a difficult place, though, in terms of thinking about what to do in the short and medium-term future. This year I can take as many and as few courses as I want, do my research, but then I'm going to be just another 25 year old with nothing but a BA, little job experience, fewer prospects and a lot of decisions to make. I could apply for that program, get accepted (hopefully), and take it for two years (maybe one of which I would have covered by my fellowship, the other I'd have to pay). But that would have be graduating just short of 27, with an MA in International Relations, after three years in Berlin, and I just don't know if that's where I want to be when I'm 27. I should be keeping my mind on the present and making the best of Berlin, and I will, but I just can't mentally buy into the "enjoy this experience, fleeting though it be, since soon enough it will be gone and you'll be working and immobile." I want to have a career, and to be working on it, and to be putting in the time to getting good experience, really moving forward and making progress. Without getting that degree here, I feel like this will be another year that offers me a lot less of that than I want. Basically I have some serious thinking to do in addition to anything I should really be getting done here. It's a bit befuddling.

But what would I do if I don't do this MA here? Do academics elsewhere? I'm really only qualified to International Relations/ Political Science research, at least outside the Humanities, which I'm not interested in. I could try and do State Department work, which wouldn't be a bad career, but which would present some challenges of lifestyle. I could try and go into Law, that good old standby for non-technical BAs currently spewing out lots of unemployed lawyers. Would it be better in 3 years when I'd graduate? It's not as if the lawyers unemployed now will just give up and try something else. They'll be around for a while. I don't know. Muddle. Muddle. Muddle.

Sorry all, no conclusiveness tonight, I'm just going to stop. This was a lot of writing. Till next.

Migraine

2010-10-07T00:46:00.001-07:00

Last night was pretty terrible. I had a migraine for the first time in a while, but it was pretty bad. I know a normal headache has transitioned into a migraine when I can't move my head in any direction, because it feels like my brain is expanding and my skull is about to crack like a eggshell from the pressure. Because I lost all my medication in the airport in Spain, though, and foolishly didn't get a refill while Stateside, I took some ibuprofen and went to sleep. I was beginning to feel a bit nauseous, but I didn't think too much of it, I just hoped I wasn't getting sick.

Then I woke in the dark shivering, absolutely shivering. I was actually too warm, and could feel that I was sweating too, and new that it was cold sweats, and I tried to lay down normally and not curl up and tuck my hands into my pockets like I was cold. It was like being a rubber band, though, and after a moment I'd spring back into my shivering curled up form. I don't think I was awake for more than a few minutes, but when I woke up the second time, I was just bathed in sweat. I took off my sweater and kicked off the sheets, trying to keep enough of me covered so that I wouldn't actually get cold. I was too awake by this point, though, and I was incredibly thirsty and also hungry. I probably skipped dinner entirely. I drank a bunch of water and had a banana, and when I looked at the clock I saw I'd only be asleep two hours.

At any rate, I drank a bunch more water, and finally feel asleep. I woke up at my normal time, and I really do feel mostly fine. My head still aches, though obviously not as bad, and my stomach is a little sore, but also not too bad. I've never had chills when I have a migraine, though, but it can't be something else. It came on so quick, and now seems mostly gone. Clearly my brain chemistry is highly confused...

Ok folks

2010-10-05T11:50:00.000-07:00

The bureaucratic pass-along continues. I had a fairly good conversation, actually, with Frau Lohr in the Political Science department. She screens applications and decides about qualifications, so basically decides my fate. Talking with her yesterday was depressing and strangely satisfying. The satisfaction came from her actually looking at my papers and addressing my individual situation, which was a new experience here and refreshing in its non-roboticness. The depression came from her more or less total lack of sympathy for my situation. I told her about qualifications in my school, my letter of support, my attempts to clarify my position prior to coming to Germany, but she basically thought I was not prepared, hadn't taken the prerequisite coursework, and simply couldn't be offered admission. The only moment, I think, where she may have felt for my plight was when I said that how could someone in my position ever participate in the program? Hadn't they unintentionally made it forbidden for foreigners to participate? I think she saw the point in that moment.

Finally, though, she leveled with me more or less and said that as an enrolled student, I can take whatever courses I want. If I were to take all the courses missing from my undergraduate degree on top of my MA coursework, I would qualify for participation in the following year. The MA classes would count towards my degree, and if I were accepted into the program I could finish it on schedule. However, she pointedly reemphasized, that would mean taking two student loads simultaneously, in German, with tests and classes and so forth.

But! She says, you could scurry over to the International Relations department. They are a similar but different department that presumably would let you do the same research and logically would let you in, given that you actually have the relevant BA degree.

So now, my plan is (is this interesting to anyone but me at this point? Continuing to be interested in my administrative woes is probably a true sign that you love me, just saying, because this is getting tedious) to go to the IR department and plead my case. The best case scenario is they would let me take classes with them right away as a visiting DAAD scholar, apply during the next application period, get accepted and continue on as if I'd been enrolled the first year.

There are a lot of "if" questions here, though. This plan will work, IF I can get take the necessary classes, and IF I can get accepted to the program eventually, and IF the DAAD supports me in my move. I feel like the DAAD is highly likely to do so, and I feel like there's a good chance that I will be accepted to the program when I apply, so at this point I'm most anxious about whether or not I can walk up to the IR staffer and be given permission to take part in his program's classes, at the last minute, without having been accepted to the program, all on the strength of my DAAD scholarship and hungry look in my eye. The program is jointly run by three universities, though, which may make it hard to get a clear answer or for anyone to exercise authority, but then again I'm just floating as a DAAD student, not really "in" another program, so there really isn't an administrative turf situation here. I'm high flexibility, low return goods.

The guy I need to talk to about this doesn't have open hours until a week from tomorrow. I sent him an e-mail, this afternoon, but he hasn't replied. We'll see...

Still with me here? Kudos. In other news, and thank God there is some, I'm returning to Sweet Old Uncle Sam America from the 17th to the 30th of December. I'll be in Minneapolis, enjoying what is supposed to be a terrible, terrible, beautiful white Christmas with Mom. I'd really like to visit people, but with everyone occupied with their own families, as well as the wide dispersion family and friends now display all across the country, I don't know if that's going to work out, sadly. It feels a bit strange to come all the way back to the States and not see Washington, but I'll hopefully be able to kick back and enjoy the holiday. Shovel some snow. Bake some cake. Minty, schnapps hot chocolate. Emmmm, I can hardly wait.

Any other news?... Not so much today, really. I tried to see the IR prof who currently holds the keys to my fickle happiness, but obviously he was away (unclear times on display, no biggie). I do have a fairly big headache, though, so I'm sitting in bed and waiting to get tired enough to fall asleep. It's only 9:00, which is pretty early for me, but I really just don't want to get sick again at all. I was really trying to think about my day too. Did I eat well? I did. Did I drink enough water? I did. How much did I sleep last night? Solid eight hours. Overexercise? Absolutely not, easy walking for a few hours. Bad posture? Blows to the head? Strange fumes, soaps, foods or activities at all? Nope all around. Can one get a headache entirely from stress? I really need to get my anxiousness under control. I reassure myself that unless highly unforetold tragedy strikes me, I will do just fine in Germany, probably in life, and really shouldn't be so concerned all the time. Where did I get this anyway? Why am I worried that not getting into an International Relations degree program this year will make me such damaged goods?

Well, a brief scan of the previous paragraph seems to imply that I think way too much about the wrong things. Or at least don't keep the right perspective. But I'll cut it off there. Too much reflection is less fun to read than exotic European adventures. In other, brief, news stories: I found two Euros on the street today. A dog defecated on my shoe from an overhead balcony. A 40 year old documentary film maker gave me her number at a DAAD dinner and told me to call her, and no, not in a friendly way. My room smells a bit like smoke from the last guy who lived here, but it's almost aired out, and!... I still haven't received my first scholarship installment, which would be nice, since I've spent most of the money in my American bank account. I'm not really worried, but one more thing to keep track of, you know?

Okay, calling it a night people, go home to your families. Best from Berlin, wish me luck in my various endeavors.

No luck so far regarding school

2010-10-05T01:04:00.000-07:00

So, on the bright side I'm feeling a lot better. My lungs are still a little sickly when I wake up in the morning, but after a bit I'm pretty much normal, so I'm on the verge of a good hill of health, any unexpected surprises aside.

Regarding my MA, though, things are looking less rosy. Yesterday I saw Frau Nürck, the woman who is my case manager, and whom I am to go to about my objection to my rejection from the program. She was almost laughably unhelpful. Actually, she was laughably unhelpful, and some months or years from now, I will laugh about how stereotypically bureaucratic she was. She went into a back room and got my file, opened it, and our conversation was like something out of the Twilight Zone, she just kept reading my letter in answer to my questions. Reading it back to me with this even tone, almost like a recording. I mean, this woman actually has no power to reconsider my position, but is still supposed to be the person that explains the decision to me, whereas I don't think she's used to critical thinking. I did, in the end, ask if there was someone in my department I can talk to about this, and she gave me the name of the person who reviewed my file and rejected me, though she specifically added that "nothing will come of it."

Sadly, I suspect that she's right. I'm beginning to think that there really is no method for redress in this system, and no appetite for accommodating atypical cases, such as myself. Though I feel highly qualified, and I'm confident I could get professors and so forth to attest to it, I could even go into some pretty sophisticated explanations of how qualified I am, I just don't think there's an audience for the argument. But, after this new woman I'm to see, I think that will be the end of it. I don't know where else to push...

I'll feel better soon, I know, but this really has sucked my enthusiasm out of my stay here. I'm already just tired from the room situation, and now I feel like this year will be another one of personal achievement, rather than helping my move forward in some way. Naturally it will be good academic experience, but now I need to reapply to other schools for the coming year, presuming I can get a decent application together in time. Obviously things will work out, I know they will, especially for me. All I need to do is push forward for a bit and good things will come my way, as always.

What I really need is a cup of coffee, though. Till soon all, best from Berlin.

- Matt(hew)

So... now I should do other things.

2010-10-03T01:15:00.000-07:00

It's very strange having a room now, though I'm sure it will seem unremarkable in a matter of days. But I paid for this room yesterday, it's mine, and I don't have to keep searching online for open places, I don't have to hover around my computer in case a new ad appears. I also don't have to continue to ask friends and acquaintances for help finding a place, or even for the gift of two or three days on a couch. I was so fixated on getting a room, on some psychological level, I didn't realize I was in Berlin. That might seem strange to read, but I was walking down the street and had a mild moment of claustrophobia, all of the sudden understanding that I was in this very new place, city and country. To say I was fixated on the room search is obviously not an exaggeration, and with that focus suddenly removed it's a little jolting. I woke up this morning and just didn't know what to do. Classes don't start for a while, I don't have to find a room, what am I going to do? Figure out next year might not be such a bad idea.

But I did have a good conversation with Sammy, my new housemate. He's a student who also works for Microsoft remotely, so up late. He spends a lot of time working in theater, apparently, and has for years. He seems to be very calm but also easygoing. Of course, we don't know each other yet, but he does seem like a good guy in general. I mentioned that I needed to go buy a mattress to sleep on and he mentioned that there's one in his basement, but that it's been there for a year. He seemed half-surprised, half-amused that I took it. I was expecting something moist and dirty that I wouldn't want to touch, but it looked just fine, practically new actually. With the gift of a chair and a stool, Sammy has generously outfitted me quite well, now I just need to find a desk and a bike, but that shouldn't be too hard.

Otherwise, today I should work on my financial aid application to Cambridge, since that's due very soon. Some coffee would be great too... Well till next, hope all's well.

Lastly, my address:

Matthew Richardson

c/o Sammy Zahra

Suderoderstr. 6

12347 Berlin

Germany

A Room!

2010-10-01T23:55:00.001-07:00

I am no longer destitute! I have a room in Neukölln, southern Berlin. It's actually a great place. A smallish room, unfurnished, with all utilities included at 250 Euros a month, which is an absolute steal. Sammy was the one who promised me a room previously, only to apologetically back out at the last moment. Well, he called and said that ever since he decided to live with another applicants he wasn't quite sure if it was the best choice. That person moved in, and after 2 days they both decided it wasn't working. Then he called me.

This really is a huge weight off my shoulders - a room! A place to put my pitifully small amount of possessions. I have to get furniture, but that's certainly a tolerable inconvenience given that I now have a roof over my head. Thanks for the all the best wishes people!

It has come

2010-10-01T06:38:00.001-07:00

Maja let me know that a friend of hers is staying on the couch beginning Sunday, as they apparently arranged months ago, but Maja assumed I would be gone by now. Fair enough. This does put me in a tighter spot to be sure. I can call some acquaintances, scramble to get a two week or one month bridging rent, or get a hostel. Still haven't heard from the apartment I visited yesterday, and I'm trying not to hope too much. I'm glad in a way that I know at least when I'll be leaving. I sigh. Much.

Well, it's still no go

2010-10-01T00:47:00.000-07:00

Well guys, it's beginning to look pretty bad. As has been a frequent topic amongst my family members and me recently, we are a high-anxiety clan, really able to worry about things with stamina. Today is the 1st of October, and I'm still roomless, which is beginning to look pretty bad. October rents are all but gone, and no people are posting for November, and few rents that start in the middle of the month. I had a good visit yesterday, and I should hear today if I got that room (which looks very nice and I'd be happy with), and another today, but if those two don't work out I'm really up against a wall. I also heard yesterday that the student housing, my up till now transitional plan B, are oversubscribed. That puts me in the difficult situation of trying to find temporary housing while looking for permanent housing while beginning my studies. If I really just can't get a thing, I may have to move into a hostel or something, presuming I can find one of those too, and continue the search from there.

I vere between a damned feeling of impending doom, and a very zen state of indifference. I'm not poor, and in not so long this will be a quaint stage in my young life where I was priced out of security for a few weeks. Right now, though, it's pretty discouraging, I have to say. Maja, that sainted Slovene, has yet to breathe a word of impatience about my stay. I keep away from the apartment to give her some space and privacy, but pretty soon I may just have a talk with her about my prospects in the next month. Could it be that she's so nice she'll more or less let me stay put for yet another week? She is really nice, but I don't know, I just don't know. Woman's on my "if you ever stay at my place in the future, you get visiting president level treatment" list, though.

In other news, I met with some Americans last night. Other scholarship holders. They were nice enough, but I'm just too preoccupied with my current homelessness to be the best company. Man, I would have made a terrible beatnick, living off the fat of acquaintances and moving around in short term bursts. I just stress out. Well, it's a sunny day, and that's something. Till soon amigos, hope all is well with you all.

Not much better yet

2010-09-29T09:04:00.000-07:00

Still no room. I saw an apartment today that was gorgeous, everything about it was really great. The area was beautiful, the room was pretty, even all three people living in the apartment already were beautiful. They were all nice, patient, and kind as we had a conversation about us and about nothing. It was such a great seeming crowd. Painfully, I feel like there's no way they'll choose me. The stress about my living situation has not abated. The other room I wanted to see was given away before I got there, so I only saw the one today. I'm beginning to wonder if I'm going to need to move into temporary housing for a month and then look for a new place while there. I'd really like to focus on my studies, though, and get this behind me. So many students are moving to the city now, though, that there are just nowhere near enough spots for us all. I need to develop some German charm, und schnell.

But even though that's really all I think about, it should be more than I talk about. In other fascinating topics, I also enrolled today at my school. I need to go back tomorrow in order to get my residency permit, since I tragically didn't have any passport photos with me at the time. I can collect my bizarrely generous gift of 100 Euros from the city, though, as a foreign student. The logic behind such a gift is lost on me, especially given the forlorn nature of the solvency of Berlin at the moment, but I'll take it without a fuss, that's for sure.

I also bought a phone today, a cell, but I'm out of luck. It's not "unlocked," which is to say I can't use it yet without visiting a shop to modify the phone very slightly. This is especially frustrating, because I specifically asked whether the phone was unlocked before buying it, so now I have to go back to the shop tomorrow and get it refunded or fixed. It's an hour round trip, so I'm not too terribly thrilled I must say.

At any rate, I'm still just sort of chugging away at getting settled here. I really do have nothing fun to report, hopefully something this week. I hope. Wish me luck people! A bit more would be great.

Life did not just get a bit easier

2010-09-27T23:27:00.000-07:00

So I was rejected by both Sammy and Martin, with either of which I would have happily moved in with. Not the best news to wake up to, since I was especially confident that Sammy was interested in living with me. To be fair, he sent me a highly apologetic e-mail on account of how much he had implied that he wanted to live together. I am left a little bitter and mostly dejected, though. Today is one week that I have been in Berlin, and it does not seem like I will have a place in the next day or two, barring a sudden break through. Maja says in Berlin one usually has to see 5 - 15 rooms in order to get a place, and she has a friend that say 50. I've seen about 12 I think, though they've been everything under the sun, and now I'm not such much more particular about places I apply to, but better informed, so I know more about a place without seeing it. It really helps deciding on whether or not to apply to a place.

When I told Maja this morning that I was unexpectedly declined by the two guys, she said it was normal and that's just finding a place in Berlin, and that I just need to keep looking, also at short term rents of 1 - 3 months. Without trying to be too analytical, I can't help but suspect that means she's wondering when I'm going to leave. Like I've been saying all along, she's a really nice person, but how long can she donate her kitchen and couch to me? I'd like to go into overdrive to find a place, but there are really only so many places to look! I should probably start planning a contingency location to use as I look for a permanent place.

In other news, at least I feel better. My nose is still a bit runny, but mostly normal. I have a bit of a cough, but not too much. As long as the cough doesn't blossom into something worse I should be normal in just a few days, which is obviously the path I'm in favor of. come 9:00 I'm going to call all the places that I want to see, and once that's done there will be nothing to do but go to any appointments I set up, and open a bank account if at all possible. Wish me luck friends, I would love a place to live.

Everything they told you was true

2010-09-27T05:50:00.000-07:00

German. Administration. Is. Terrible. I just spent three hours of my life in a stuffy Berlin hallway. I guess this is the baptism by fire that is standing in lines and waiting for paperpushers to do their magic. What makes it worse, so much worse, is I shouldn't even be there. There was one lady to process the enrollment papers of foreign students, and there were dozens, scores really, of students waiting outside the door for a three hour window for document processing. The students made a list of who arrived first. I was annoyed that I was 20th on the list, since I arrived earlier, but I wasn't in the crowd that began the list, so it wasn't entirely objectively constructed. The listed rapidly exceeded 50, and would have grown further if people could have pushed through the crowd choking the hallway to get to it. Finally, some staffer of the university came, told us to get into a single file line, and ripped the list off the wall. Everyone did exactly what you'd expect - we rushed forward and created the complete opposite of a line. Each student was taking 10 - 15 minutes to process, so I was in for hours of waiting. There was rumor, unsubstantiated of course, that the single woman, a Frau Nürck, stays a few hours afterwards and hands out numbers 1-20. Everyone else has to go home. Without going through this process, one can neither register for classes, nor use University resources, nor buy the reduced price transit pass.

But why was this worse for me? I don't have to register here. My scholarship, in one if it's few direct elitisms, gives me a private appointment to do this elsewhere. I was there, because this unlucky and busy Frau is also the woman to whom I must go to contest my rejection for a full MA by Humboldt. I called her - but her voicemail says she's unreachable during this part of the year due to registrations, and my e-mail to her was responded to with a terse: come to my open hours at the office. I can try again Wednesday, when she's open again. Boy do I have a headache. And all for nothing...

The more things stay the same, the more they stay the same.

2010-09-26T21:59:00.000-07:00

So, there's not as much to report as I wish there was from the last post, but certainly more than a worst case scenario. I've seen quite a few rooms, some of which are pretty memorable. People are still living in all the Communist era housing that was constructed in East Berlin, and it's some remarkable stuff. There was this huge high-rise where almost none of the rooms had windows and the ceilings were so low that I was a bit claustrophic looking in them. Then there was a converted building where an apartment had been divided into three apartments, where the shower was in the old kitchen cabinet, tiled over. They still used coal heating, which one had to bring up the stairs in buckets. Intense, right?

But I'm waiting to hear back from two other places, both of which seemed really nice to me and I would take if given an offer. One was with theology student Martin, who seemed nice if very shy and soft spoken. The rooms had lots of light, there was a garden across the street, and it's not a bad commute. The other room was nearby, and it was with a half-Egyptian, half-German guy who also seemed very relaxed and nice. They said they'd e-mail me today, so I'm hoping that I'll know my new address pretty soon here.

And that mostly has been my life, look for rooms. It's just this time crush is weighing on me. I need to go to the foreigners office today and register myself, for which I need an address. I need to do that in order to get a bank account or register for classes, so I'm really hoping to get the housing situation finished and move on to other stressful things. My host appears to not care a bit that I'm continuing to sleep on fold out couch, which is really generous, given that I've been here six days already.

What makes it all worse though is this cold. For two days my throat was really sore, and as of yesterday my nose has been really plugged. I don't feel laid up, just tired all the time. I'm trying to eat healthy and drink a lot, but really I should be just resting at home, which obviously I can't do if I'm looking for a room. I'm really hoping that this doesn't transition into a third stage of coughing. Today won't be good for helping that goal, though, I don't think. I have to go to the foreigners office, and look for more rooms if Sammy and Martin decide against me. Bleh.

Another slog

2010-09-23T13:56:00.000-07:00

Whew boy, a short message today, since I'm all worn out. I woke up this morning with a sore throat, and now, at 11:00 PM, I'm pretty sure I have a cold. After a long flight and foreign microfauna, it's no surprise, but it's not convenient either. I've had a lot of tea and plenty of produce, but it may be too late to nip it in the bud.

Otherwise, I went to see two places today, a studio (very nice, kind of expensive for me, and pretty far out of the city), and the second place I arrived at too late, because I was confused by the neighborhood and by the time I arrived the apartment was closed. So much for that. I even took a nap in the middle of the day of an hour or so. Tomorrow I'm going to the university, hopefully to talk to some administrative woman about my program and about a full MA. We'll see, we'll see. I don't know how that will go at all.

Okay, I'm going to check more listings online and see if there are any glowing opportunities I really want to get a jump on, then to bed. Night!

Day 1

2010-09-22T12:15:00.000-07:00

So, day 1 is over. More or less - it's past 9:00 PM, so there's no more calling of people to be done tonight. Man-o-man, I've been at it today finding a place. I sent out about 15 e-mails, called six people, visited three apartments. It takes time to do all that! I'm both impressed and depressed by the Berlin housing market, as is probably the case in every city the work over. No one ever says "it really is easy and convenient to find a good value apartment in this burg!" I'm thinking I'm going to end up spending 250 Euros on an apartment, after my additional housing stipend, which is fine, but I'm feeling stressed about it. Maja is being very nice about my staying here, she even mentioned that she was having friends over Saturday, so there was going to be a party in the very kitchen where I sleep! I hope to be so cool one day as to help a young, innocent globetrotter for a week or so while he or she finds an apartment. Having a phone and internet connection free of charge really makes life easier.

As for the housing options I saw today, none were inspiring, but none were terrible either, which bodes well for the future. The first place I saw was a studio that was a bit old and dirty, but would presumably be cleaned. It was a good price, but the rented required an extra half grand for his fold out couch, TV and surround sound system. I wasn't up for it, given the extra cost. Plus, it would be nice to live with some Germans. It's not that I wouldn't live in a studio, but I'd rather pocket the difference and know some Germans on the side. The second place was interesting. The owner was a 27 year old German named Mathias (German for Matthew, in case that wasn't obvious), whose relatives had died. Consequently he came into the apartment, which hasn't been updated since the generation before Communism fell, and was looking for a roommate. He was a very hip looking event planner with some skin condition that left him mostly hairless. He seemed very competent and thoughtful, though. He even said not to call him for a day or two, because he didn't want a roommate who moved in on rash decision, which I thought was very bright of him. The only hitch in the get along is that he would want me to sigh a full year lease. I'm hoping to go straight to month-to-month so I'm not saddled with two extra months when my scholarship expires. I'll run it by him and just be honest. Lastly, I looked at the room of a Euro-snowbird. He owns the apartment, but only lives in one room with his kids four months a year and lives in Spain the other eight. Not a bad way to manage things, really. I liked the place alright, and would probably take it if they call me back, even though the other borders looked like professionals and non very engaging. So it goes.

At any rate, that was probably less interesting for you, since you didn't spend all day organizing it, but so it goes. Tomorrow it happens again, hoorah!

Bei Maja

2010-09-21T11:10:00.000-07:00

Home sweet somebody else's home. I'm at Emily's friend Maja's apartment, and it is nice to not be in a plain anymore. The trip was... problematic, but ultimately okay. José picked me up right on-time and we got to the airport just fine. I got on my plain (middle seat, bad luck that) and I snoozed most of the way to JFK without incident. My bag was even 2 pounds over the limit and the nice checker-man just told me to "be careful about the weight next time." Sadly, his niceness only will encourage this behavior in the future.

The harsh part of the trip happened just as we landed in JFK - I started to get a headache. Those of you who remember me from just a few years ago know that I get migraines occasionally, and they always expand from a normal headache gone untreated. I had no over-the-counter stuff, and my migraine medicine was lost in the Málaga airport five months ago. Of course, I'd gotten three hours of sleep at home before getting up early, then had two-ish on the flight, and had had no coffee, so circumstances were aligned to hurt. And they did. I was on the floor of JFK next to my gate, trying not to move my head the tiniest bit. I bought a cup of coffee and 800 mg of ibuprofen and drank a quart of water sip by sip and just tried to fall asleep. I was beginning to feel sick to my stomach, though, and was afraid that this was going to be a repeat of my trip from hell flight to Spain. Luckily, though, I woke up about two hours later feeling worse than normal but better than before, so I knew the worst of it was passed. Then I talked with moma (now luckily I didn't have to worry her about the situation). Got on the flight and slept 4 or so hours to Berlin.

It was easy collecting my luggage and getting the bus into town, where Maja showed up and took me to her place. I took yet another nap for about three hours at about 5:00 AM Seattle time, and now it's evening here, about 8:00 PM. I spent a few hours looking at housing options, because now I can call using Maja's home phone and set up some appointments. Maja really does seem to be an absolute gem of a girl. She folded out the couch so I could take a nap, made some veggies for dinner and offered all sorts of good advice on neighborhoods. She even said she'd be happy to get the building manager to sign my form saying I lived with her, that way I can register at the immigration office right away, and then I can just change my address. I don't think it'll come to that, but I appreciate the helpfulness. Now I'm just drinking tea and how much to try and get done before going to bed. It is really very convenient to speak German, I have to say.

Well, I'm in Germany. Auf Wiedersehen! (No on says that, it's too formal).

Deutschland Bound!

2010-09-19T23:43:00.000-07:00

Hey all,

This is the first post of my blog, now retitled in recognition of my new destination, Berlin Germany. I leave in about four hours, and for some reason am writing this blog instead of getting a few hours of sleep before my flight. Generally the preparation is going well. All my worldly belongings besides a few books and sentimental artifacts are in one suitcase and a carry-on backpack. I had planned to take two pieces of luggage, but when everything I wanted fit comfortably into the first bag, I nixed that plan.

I have a lot to do once I arrive in Berlin, namely find a place to live (I'll be staying the first few days with a friend of a friend, Maja). I also need to get a phone, get a residence permit, and get studying. There will be a lot to do, but I'm trying to stay zen about it. Even-keeled, so to speak. At any rate, I wanted to break the ice with a reigniting of this blog, and that is done. I hope you all have fun watching me navigate Berlin, and till soon!

Hot on the heels of the last one post

2010-06-13T09:12:00.000-07:00

Whew. Eight hours of walking and standing really takes it out of you. Did I also mention I slept in the airport last night? I'm a bit weary. I found out that the bus connections to my airport were non-existent in the early morning, so I had to go out about ten hours early. I did sleep about six of those, though... I really can sleep in challenging places, that's got to by my one real travel advantage over others. Six hours on a slanted bench, legs hung over and armrest, shirt over my face as a shield against florescent lights, flight announcements at all hours. By the time I woke there was already a line at my flight desk. But I digress.

I went straight to Pilgrim's Mass today. Santiago is a major destination for pilgrims, and nowadays for people taking the month long walk from the French border to this city. There are thousands a year, and that mass was the first one I've ever seen in Europe where the place was PACKED. No joke. First the pews filled. Then the floor space filled with squatters. Then the edges of the side naves filled with people standing (like me, though I had a good view). Apparently every day during the spring and summer they have to turn people away!

Well, it was a 75 minute mass, but standing the whole time takes its toll and I got pretty tired. I was happy that I could understand almost all of what was said, though. The last mass I went to, Christmas, was pretty rough on that score, and I didn't get all that was said at all. The mass I went to the first week in Spain was, naturally, a complete loss on me. It's gratifying to see the improvement. There was a nun who sang special pilgrims' hymns too, and that was really beautiful. Clearly a woman who has practiced all her life (she seemed 45-ish). I could certainly have heard her sing for an hour or two, but sadly all I got was three or four songs, though they had that especially soaring and plaintive wailing quality that makes really good choral music. Very beautiful. Ultimately, they swung an incense dispenser (I'm sure there's a correct name for that object) over the transept of the church so that the incense filled the place immediately. Five men heaved a rope to move the thing forty or so feet in the air. It was a good mass.

Afterwards I walked around the city. They have so much dark, mossy stonework that this place almost seems German, northern European at least, especially with all the green plants everywhere. I went to a few museums, most of which focus on pilgrimage in Galicia, Spain or in general, and all of which were good. The interactive Contemporary Art Museum gets points from me for having an entire floor hooked up with microphones so that the exhibits made sounds. I couldn't find a good lunch in my 7 - 11 Euro sweet spot, so I settled for making a sandwich of sardines, followed by an apple and orange. I'm a little undecided about how healthy that is. Nothing in it is unhealthy, but without a veggie presence I'm in doubt. But since I realized canned fish go with bread as well as cheese, my consumption of it while traveling has really blossomed. Ah well, I'll get tapas tonight and try some of the regional specialties, like the octopus is garlic mayo, or the mussels in anything imaginable.

The local sweet is called Tarta de Santiago which means Cake of St. James, which is basically a pound cake with lots of ground almonds added. They sell it in dinner plate sized portions, though, and not individuals slices, so I was wondering how I was going to handle the situation. Luckily, though, I popped into a cafe to see if maybe they would sell me a slice at the end of the day (it was already 6:00 PM). When I went into this cafe, there was no one behind the counter. I knocked on the back room, and no one answered. I looked in the bathroom, and no one was there either. The door to the cafe hadn't even been just unlocked, it was propped open! I opened the door to the back room and yelled in that I was a customer. No one answered, so I stepped in and could hear water running, but no one was anywhere. Suddenly I had a bit of fear that I was going to find some woman on the ground with a broken neck. There were some closets, but they were empty, and there was a basement, but it looked long since closed. I was alone in a bakery! I saw a faucet streaming water next to a mop and wondered if someone had run out in an emergency or something. I went back into the front room and just stood there for a minute, contemplating, when a woman came bounding across the street and into the store. She just said hello, and I told her she had me worried sick, so she laughed agreeably. She also gave me a portion of cake, so all's well that ends well.

Incidentally, I've been eating the cake and drinking coffee while writing this. Originally I was thinking of staying in Santiago for two days, but honestly I feel like I saw so much of it today that the interesting things remaining for tomorrow don't justify a second day. I may one-night-stand Santiago. We will see. Best from the verdant north!

De viaje

2010-06-13T00:34:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

I'm traveling now, and also neglecting my blog, and starting to feel a bit guilty about it. I can only hope that you've all been waiting for me to post something and haven't given up on reading my blog entirely by now!

Regardless, I've been on the move, no joke. In the last week I've gone to Cadiz (a small but dense, beautiful and historically important city in Andalucia), Malaga (famous for being an industrial hole, but I found gorgeous! Maybe the nicest in Andalucia, bar none) and finally Barcelona. Barcelona has such a reputation for being cultural and beautiful and impressive in so many ways. I did enjoy the place, but it was really expensive, and not worlds away from what I'm used to. I went to a lot of architecturally meaningful buildings, for which Barcelona is well known, and hit up a few museums as well. The staff at my hostel mocked me for not going out, though. I'm just not party-oriented enough to buy expensive drinks in loud bars at 2:00 AM, and this forever makes me an outcast in Spain, sadly. Still, I'm glad I saw the city, and I'd certainly go back, since it's huge and impossible to know in four days. I also went to a large monastery called Monserrat, which was perhaps the most impressive natural setting I've yet seen in Europe. A huge, rich church community perched in a nook of a mountain, with all sorts of hiking trails and vnatage points. It was a good day trip and I'm glad I made it.

I've also been overcoming several obstacles, largely of my own making. Indulge some complaining:
- heavy backpack: 35K, or about 75 lbs. I can move it, but I don't like it. In all fairness, this is pretty much all I lived on in Almeria all these months, so it's not so bad.
- cuts: I cut both thumbs. One, stupidly, through a plastic bag with a razor. It bled much, and is sore. The other one, ridiculously, I cut with a dull knife a half second after muttering "this fish is slippery!" Irony at work. I even laughed at the time. Cuts thumbs makes packing much more difficult.
- stress: I'm waiting to hear back from Humboldt University to make sure I don't need to submit more documents. This keeps me glued to a computer and anxious.
- vision: this is the worst of my problems. I lost, somehow, my toiletries bag in the Malaga airport. That means I lost my glasses and all my replacement contacts. For the time being I'm fine with this pair, but if they break or some such, I will be effectively blind. I'm going to ask my optometrist to e-mail me my prescription so that I can perhaps get them filled here for new contacts. I needed new glasses, but I didn't think it would end this way...

And now I'm in Santiago de Compostela, and have been for about two hours. I took the time to say hello to you all, but now I need to go explore. This is the greenest part of Spain, and I'm enjoying the clouds and trees - feels homey. The cathedral here is particularly famous, so I'm going to a noon mass to see if I can do anything about that soul of mine...

Also, funny post script, I've had one policeman and one airline attendant laugh at my Andalucian accent now. I realize that it's like some exotic foreigner who has lived in Mississippi going to New York and speaking like a southerner and a foreigner at the same time. I clearly amuse them. All for the best though.

Till next! Best from Galicia!

- Matt(hew)

May has come

2010-05-07T02:18:00.000-07:00

My last month is Spain is upon me. My last day at work will be the 31st, and I'm only paying half rent for June, so soon I'm be a traveling man again. I really need to figure out exactly where I'll be going before coming back to Seattle, but the impending end of my teaching here in Almería is beginning to weigh on my mind, that's for sure.

There will be some fun these last few weeks, though, for sure. It looks pretty certain now that I'll go back to Córdoba and see their festival of the patios, when all these old stately buildings let people into their central enclosed patios to enjoy them. It only happens once a year, and I'll enjoy going to Córdoba when it's not raining cats and dogs. I think I'm going on a day hike this Sunday, and with the weather suddenly so nice here, I should be able to kill time happily outside.

As for things here at school, it's much the same as always. I am constantly amused by the idea of "being in a hurry" here. My favorite, as always, is my boss Ana, who stands over a newspaper mumbling "ooooh I have to hurry... oooooh I have no time." Then she flips a page. If I ask her a question, she just says she's so busy she can't help just now. It's pretty cute, really. The government is also shipping in boxs of fruit and veggies to the school to encourage healthy eating. The teachers benefit as well, naturally, and the pears today were particularly good. I'm struck by the fact that this country's even more in debt than the US, really spending money it doesn't have, yet they're still paying me to come in during a strike (when really I wonder if my job should exist at all, given public finances), and providing free fruit plates so that I don't even really need to eat breakfast before coming.

Jorge, one of my Spanish amigos here, laughed at me the other day. Dark laughter, I might add. I told him I was grateful for my job and the opportunity to teach here, but I feel like "dinero perdido," wasted money. He just laughed and laughed. His point was that there are huge highways that aren't utilized enough and were overbudget anyway, not to mention all the graft that doesn't produce anything at all. He thought I was funny for thinking of myself as worthy of the attention necessary to be cut from the budget; basically there are bigger fish to fry.

Jorge is also a funny character that is always trying to motivate me to chase Spanish girls. Apparently I through away lots of advantages, such as saying truthfully and with total disregard for flirtatious openings that I teach English in an elementary school rather than that I am here for artistic inspiration. He styles himself Doctor Amor, but I have some doubts. His latest problem is being unable to go to a suburb of Almería called Aguadulce because he has too many girlfriends there to be seen with any single one of them, lest he be sighted cavorting about. I used to opportunity to break out one of the Spanish idiomatic expressions I've been studying: "la avaricia rompe el saco" Greed rips the bag. Like, you put too many things in a bag, because you're greedy, so it bre due to the weight. I like it. I like Jorge too, of course, and wonder how much I'll know what happens to him and the others when I leave...

Ah well, off to the students. Till soon friends!

More on Matthew

2010-04-22T02:48:00.000-07:00

Well, the weather's clearing up and I am now, I think, living an almost disappointly normal life here in Almería. I'm beginning to become a bit embarrassed about how mundane everything is here. I teach my "clases particulares," my private lessons, and I get out my books from the library, and I go for walks on the Paseo Marítimo, the pedestrian only walk along the shore. Every Thursday at least I go out with Antonio and Esteban and the rest of the Spanish guys we get tapas. My Spanish is just good enough that it doesn't take much work to explains things to me, so I really don't get stressed about it anymore.

I'm really happier about this mundane development, though, because it's really a lot harder to be a local than a tourist. Clearly I'm not really a Spaniard or an Almerian even, but it's harder to have local favorites and local friends than it is to breeze through a place, see the sights, and get on with life elsewhere. I'm not really embedded in the city, but I will miss some parts of life here. Not that I should really be nostalgic already, since I still have about two months, or really seven weeks, left here. That's about 25% of my time, so I shouldn't let enthusiasm flag, but my tendency to think ahead is getting ahead of me, so to speak.

My school's been a bit ridiculous of late, though. The director of the school, Susana, played a cruel joke on the new teachers, all five of them. She got all the senior teachers together and arranged to have a snap meeting where all the new hires were told, with the most serious faces, that their reviews had gone terribly. Did they want to explain themselves before she passed out their officil reviews, confirming or not confirming their permanent hire? The responses were everything from highly flustered, to angry and defensive, to cold and curt. They opened their packets and found tiny awards the school had made for them, along with their passing certificates which everyone had earned. Cristina, the newest hire, cried in front of everyone because she was so relieved and stressed and what have you. But, in good Spanish fashion, her attempts to leave the room and pull herself together was intercepted and she was made to laugh, cry and stutter for a few minutes surrounded by her smiling coworkers. The Spanish are nothing if not social, at least the Andalucians. I suppose this is academic hazing in Spain...

This weekend has the potential to be very nice, though. I've rented a car and the Alpujarra Mountains and the Cabo de Gata beaches are on the agenda. There's finally good weather forecast, and it's been great for days now, so maybe it'll actually happen this time. I'll have Johanna as a companion too, since she's coming to visit from Jaén. This will probably be the last time I'll see her before I'm back in the States, so hopefully it'll be a fun weekend. Speaking of which, I should reseach a bit better what beaches and places to go to, so I'll sign off now. Best from Andalucía my Western Hemisphere chums, I hope all's well.

Huelga baby!

2010-04-13T03:11:00.000-07:00

There' s a huelga afoot. That's right, the teacher's at school are going on strike tomorrow. It was announced late yesterday, which means I just heard about it. No one really knows what's going to happen, though, since teacher's in other parts of Spain and Andalucía may or may not decide to join in. Additionally, parents may or may not know that a strike is happening and send their kids to school. I, as a temporary teacher, am not in the union so I still need to bus out here in the morning. and hang out with the administrators.

I must say, though, that's it's interesting to go to a country where I feel like people still strike. It's funny how different the attitude here is to so much of what I'm used to in the states. I don't think of striking as something that's always in the right or wrong, but I definitely have the instinctual feeling that striking is for people who have lost sight of reality. In my mind, perhaps unfairly, strikers are people who don't realize their in a society with too many unemployed people to replace them, or working for companies looking for a good time in the business cycle to move the company overseas. Why strike if all you're doing is ensuring your own decreased earnings and giving your employer a long-sought opportunity to restructure even more in their favor. Maybe that's a bit ignorant of me, but the Kaiser Aluminum strike in Spokane that dragged on for two years and ended with most of the strikers eventually not being hired back, and only then at reduced wages, sticks in my mind. In my head, striking is a 20th century phenomenon, and not one that makes sense in 21st century America.

But, in Spain, they have confidence this is an acceptable and applicable thing to do. Of course, because their country is the size of Montana you can really get everyone to participate. Obviously you can't get all American teachers to strike period, but it would be impressive if you could. I suppose that's what they're doing. Also, did you know in a lot of European countries you can't fire strikers who legally register their strike and agree to government mediated discussions between labor and management? I don't know how that would work with government employees striking, but it's certainly odd to think that a union can strike and yes, not be paid, but also can't be fired or permenently replaced during the legal duration of the strike (which depends on your profession and abitration with the government). Talk about shocking the American boy here in Almería. Seriously, these people are so unconcerned right now, just chatting it up.

Ah well though. This ultimately doesn't concern me too much. In other news the warmth is beginning to creep back into southern Spain. It's still almost jacket weather in the morning, but by noon or one there's about 26º to be relied on, at least lately. That's beach worthy for a few hours, not that I've taken advantage. This weekend may be different, though. I really don't have all that many weekends left, so I'd best take advantage of them if I can. There are still some nice beaches and mountains not far from Almería, an I'd really like to explore them if I can.

I'm excited to keep practicing Spanish, but I'm also really glad ot get to visit Seattle again in the summer. Obviously I don't have a job there. Or a home. Or even really a practical purpose, but I'm looking forward to seeing people again and enjoying good coffee and beer with good amigos. I wonder where I'll be in five years... Don't we all, I suppose. Till soon! Maybe I'll write again tomorrow, since it could be that I'll have quite a bit of free time.

Check in part 2

2010-04-09T02:46:00.000-07:00

Hey all, I thought I'd check back in now and talk a bit more about Semana Santa and my travels, since I stopped suddenly at Lagos in the last post. Afterwards, the big visit coming was Sevilla, which celebrates Easter like no where else, just because it's so big! It is the largest city in Andalucia, and it was just choked for the week.

I don't know how widespread knowledge of Spanish Easter customs are, but I was totally in the dark beforehand, so let me explain. Anywhere from 100 to 2500 Nazarenos (people in matching full body costumes of repentence) walk from their local church to the city Cathedral. They take a large float with them, weighing thousands of pounds and carried by a tight group of stuggling men. Ususally there's a band and sometimes a choir that follows the float and they parade all day and night. But because there are so many processions, and because the streets are so small, and because the lines are so long with marchers, the city is a mess. It took hours to walk a really small distance. Crowds followed the floats and so the mess was constantly evolving too. A lot of people specifically avoid Sevilla because it's too crazy during Semana Santa, but I'm glad I got to see it.

Afterwards, the route back to Almería went through Jerez de la Frontera, and some small mountain towns in the Sierra Grazalema. They were beautiful towns, with great views. I'd really like to hike or at least go on some walks in those hills, but obviously there just wasn't time this trip. By the time I got home, I was really ready to sleep in my own bed.

So, that takes me back to this week. Now I'm sitting here in the school teacher's lounge, sipping awful coffee and waiting for class to start. The coffee really is bad, tasting of something new and interestingly strange every day. Today I took a sip and just thought: bacon. Why does my coffee taste like bacon? Better than shoes, again, I suppose. (The Spanish do not have coffee down, it seems to me...)

But this weekend I don't have too much on the agenda. If the weather holds I might visit the beach. It's only 23 to 25 degrees at midday, which is in the seventies I suppose, but you can't get in the water or hang out all day without getting cold. I'll take my trip to the market and maybe get some drinks with some friends from my program. I've been gone so much, it would nice to have an at home night out. I'm also happy with my Spanish. I'm still not anywhere near fluent of course, but I can usually have an easy conversation now without issues or nervousness. Only people from small towns (pueblos) speak too rough for me to make out. Meeting people from northern Spain or Latin America is often a gift - they speak so much clearer! Ah well, till next!

Back in town!

2010-04-06T03:14:00.001-07:00

I'm back in Almería, and that was a good Easter break, I have to say. A 2500 kilometer trip (1500 miles) through Mérida in Spain, through the gorgeous Portuguese countryside, and down the coast of Portugal from Lisbon. From there it was to Sevilla, then through the sourthern hills of Cadiz province and back to Almería. It was a 12 day trip, and consequently I can't tell everything, but it was a really interesting vacation that I would gladly repeat just to see the same places again.

The first place was Mérida, which is an old Romanb capital of Spain and has some really wonderful ruins. They were buried for centuries, and that accounts for how well preserved they are. Some places, like the hipodrome (where cheriots raced) are just unusually flat fields now, and others, like arches and walls and aquiducts sections, are just puzzle pieces that give you a lot to work with your imagination on, but aren't much of the original structure. Still, with so many bits of evidence around, it's a good city to wander in. The real gems, though, are the theater and the amphitheater, where people were eaten by lions and plays were performed. The Romans used really colorful marbles and steep seating, so it's an impressive place to take a sit and observe. The museums in town are really complete and well put together too, so it really hit the historical spot, so to speak.

Portugal, though, was the best part of the trip for me. I would never tell the Spaniards this, but they make almost the exact same food in Portugal (only maybe just a bit to a bunch better!). The cheese, wine, fish and especially bread and pastries were practicall a problem, since stopping for them verged on interrupting general touristic activities. Alentejo, which is the rolling hills, small farms, small towns, and romantic stand alone tree part of Portugal between Spain and Lisbon, is perhaps the prettiest part of Europe that I have seen. Granted it was sunny and warm and green, which has not been a part of my life recently, so it may have seemed extra splendid, but it really was a great place. If I were to get a summer place in Europe, it might be there.

Lisbon was also great, only a bit of a surprise. I knew it was the poorest country in Western Europe, but Lisbon really is a bit grimey. It's probably just like Spain 15 years ago, and I really did like the place, but all the old buildings and for sale signs made clear that it has a few sprucing up years to go. Buying a place there would probably be a great investment, though. I'm sure the property will be snapped up soon enough, given how big a destination the city's becoming. And it should be! All the old colonial imperial grandeur is obvious. There are so many palaces and huge churches and broad streets. It's clear Lisbon had a long day in the sun. Besides that, though, there's the atmosphere too. So many small bars in small streets with small parks of small trees. It's a good city for a cozy café and paper. There's so much to see, though, that three days doesn't quite do it. I'll certainly go back if I get a chance.

The last place in Portugal was Lagos, which is a small beach city in the south which is known for it's great weather and beaches. It was unseasonably cold and windy, so that was less than it could have been, but still a nice place. It has the oldest slave market in Europe, though. Just a tiny square now, it was a selling point for Africans from before America was discovered. There were an impressive number of foreigners, though, so it clearly is on the map as far as visiting from abroad goes.

Okay, well, there's more to report, but class has almost started again here, so I'm going to post this and get to work. Till soon, and best from Spain!

Back in town!

2010-04-06T03:14:00.000-07:00

Last post from Almería for a bit

2010-03-25T04:07:00.000-07:00

I leave today for my Semana Santa vacations, so this might be the last post I put up for a bit. Of course, it might also not be, depending on whether I find internet access easily, but we'll just see. I have to go out to the airport and pick up the rental car, but the weather's grand and the temperature perfect. I do have a bit of a sore throat, though, which I'm hoping won't blossem into anything worse. It's been pretty stable for the last two days, though, so I think I'll be fine. We will see. We will see.

Otherwise I'm excited about the trip. Tomorrow I'll be in Mérida, and I'll be able to see some of the best Roman ruins in the world. They also are known there for their hams and rabbit stews, so maybe I'll avail myself of that part of the tradition. Okay, off to class, just wanted to say hi. Toodles!

A bit of sun to look forward to

2010-03-22T01:59:00.000-07:00

Heyo all,

Obviously I've been out of the loop for a bit of a bit, but it's because I've been busy and distracted, which is good, right? Just this last weekend I went to Granada for a second time. Torry was going back to visit some friends and see the Fiesta de la Primavera, or Spring Festival, and I came along for the ride. It's really not very festive in the sense of culturally important, but there were tens of thousands of young people drinking in an open parking lot that is the botellón.

It was a good visit, though, because I do like going to Granada. It's a much more famous and attractive city, frankly. The university downtown makes it full of bars and shops and so the city feels active. More importantly, there are all sorts of old buildings and monuments, relics of the Moorish and Reconquest periods, so it's just a striking city. Still, to learn Spanish and get some good exposure to Spanish culture, Almería was a lucky placement, since there are so many fewer foreigners. In Granada there were a sea of tourists, but in Almería I can blend in so much better.
I also went to an instrumental and choral performance at the cathedral in downtown Almería. I do have to say, the high stone ceiling and all the medieval decoration make it a great atmosphere to listen to music in. I ended up talking to an older man named Ferdinando, who's a professional photographer and who showed me all around the cathedral and pointed out places and things he'd taken pictures of and knew about.

Otherwise the weather has been improving here, which is such a godsend. Days without rain have become notably common, and there's a good deal of sun. I think we're through the worst of the surprise winter of discontent here, but it's still too cool to hit the beach or go outside all day without a sweater or coat. I was hoping for a more indulgent Semana Santa, which is the Easter vacation week, but I don't know if that will be the case after all.

Speaking of vacation, though, I leave on Thursday! The schedule now is the Mérida, Lisbon, Lagos, Sevilla, Arcos de la Frontera, and Ronda if it can be shoehorned into the trip. I'm getting excited to be sure, although this will be my last big vacation period before the end of the program. That's not really a problem, but that means this is the last convenient time to move widely in Spain, and I'll be using it to finally see the other half of Andalucía.

In terms of the small annoyances in life, I just reapplied for this program for next year as a final fallback option (I don't think I'll do it, but I want the option). Writing essays that you don't think will eventually get you anything is difficult, since there's a lack of motivation. My roommate also continues to be highly reclusive. He's been hiding in his room all day, and I think he's just waiting to move and doesn't want to have to interact. It's not really a difficult thing to deal with, but it's mildly uncomfortable to have a recluse in the house. It does mean I feel like I'm living along half the time, though, which is a benefit in terms of cheapness for my apartment, I suppose.

Okay, I'm off to teach the youngsters of Spain the beauty of English. Till soon amigitos!

Jaén

2010-03-09T00:50:00.000-08:00

Back in chilly Almería. People keep telling me that this is the coldest and wettest winter in years, and I do believe it given how poorly prepared so many people are, but with Easter vacation coming in just over two weeks, I don't think I have a very cosy break to look forward to. It probably won't be the drenching trip that Erina and I had, but I don't expect too much time on the beach either...

But, this weekend just passed, I did do another little trip. Vanesa, a coworker of mine who has offered to give me a ride to any interesting places she travels to, told me that she was going to Jaén for the weekend. A quick call to Johanna confirmed I could visit, and so I spend Friday night, Saturday, and half of Sunday on the other side of the Sierra Nevadas. It was a fun drive too, because the land is really very beautiful between Almería and Jaén, transitioning from desert to more verdent farmland. I talked with Vanesa too, about general conversation topics, and I was really glad to be able to have a three hour conversation fairly naturally in Spanish.

The main adventure in Jaén, though, was visiting two fairly famous cities nearby: Baeza and Úbeda. Long story short, they are small cities that twice received a lot of money hundreds of years ago. The first time, they were strategically impotant during the Christian reconquest of southern Spain from the Moors, and secondly because of some important connections between the royal family and local aristrocrats. That means that the two cities have lots of great architecture that was spared redevelopment, given that the cities really can't justify a lot of economic dynamism.

It was just cold and windy and wet, though, all of Saturday. The churches and palaces were generally open and available, all Romanesque and well preserved, but in the church tower in Baeza where I could see the whole town I was almost blown over by the wind funneling through the small windows. It was just bone chilling. Johanna chided me for wanting a coffee and pastry every 30 minutes, but I prevailed two or three times including lunch, so I was kept fairly happy.

Otherwise there is little to report here. However, keeping to my piglet-like tendency to comment on food, I've made a beautiful discovery. They have a fresh cheese here called Queso de Burgos, which is really just unaged fresh set cheese, like Indian paneer I supposed. I cut up a golf ball sized portion and added it to my lentil soup (super typical here). It was a great idea, I'm kind of looking forward to eating it again when I get home.

Okay, that's your Matthew fix - till next!

Long Weekend, but interesting

2010-03-05T02:02:00.001-08:00

From Friday morning to Tuesday afternoon I was traveling, and it was a challenging weekend to say the least. The plan was to go from Almería to Alicante, Alicante to Valencia, and Valencia to Jumilla/Yecla (a wine region), and thence home. That is what we did, but there were some mishaps to say the least.

Friday morning we left, and I drove a car for the first time in Europe. It was not as different as Spain's reputation somehow convinced me, but I do have to say that the speed limit seems more flexibly enforced, and people in large vehicles seem unfazed by following closey behind other cars at hi speeds, but all in all not a bad experience. We had a good car too, a VW Golf, one of the new ones that was comfortable and perky to drive. Bueno.

We reached Alicante in a few hours, four I believe, and checked into our hotel without incident, but I found parking in Europe to be much more challenging that driving in Europe. Not only were the streets really thin, and I mean just barely wide enough for our small car, taking tight corners with the car and looking for parking was a bit rattling. I wasn't really stressed about it all, since I didn't mind going slow, but I didn't enjoy trickling away the time we had to explore the city looking for a place to put the car. Torry had the bright idea to park the car and ask the reception of our hotel for ideas, and I pulled what we call "the Spanish park," which is stopping your car anywhere that plausably allows other's to pass you and turning on the hazard lights. I joke that the Spaniards actually believe this button pauses time, and that's why they can hit the lights and just block traffic while they take groceries up a few flights to their apartment, or stop and have a chat with an old buddy, but anyway. Torry was told there was a construction site nearby that had opened up a lot of parking, and I boldly drove our car over a sidewalk and median so as to park beside the chain link fence on a clearly illegal loacation, although there were similar parkers all around. It was a great spot.

Alicante itself was interesting too. It's famous for it's nightlife, but the castle above town is huge and a has a great view, plus is free. We walked up there, hiked really, and enjoyed the views of the town and of the ocean before going back down into the town for supper. We got a menú, which is a cheaper full meal with preset courses. Ours was terrible. I didn't eat the soup, because after a few sips the fish tasted untrustworthy, but Torry did and was fine in the end. Our paella was tasteless and greasy, and the pork cutlet was dry and tough. I got fruit for desert, which was alright. All that complaining done, it was a lot of food for 9€. What made it best, though, was the terribly confused background music, some sort of 70s movie soundtrack, with Jesus Christ Superstar mixing with The Godfather. We had a good laugh. We did, however, buy small Cuban cigars, just to say we tried Cuban tobacco in Europe. Torry got sick after a few puffs of his, whereas I did not. Should that be worrying?

The next day we left early for Valencia, but I just about ruined the trip for Torry by saying that we should pull off and visit a tiny town with a hilltop church to enjoy some of the afternoon on a beautiful day. While trying to manuever the small streets, Torry, who was driving, was stuck trying to back out of a turn so sharp our car couldn't take it. He was pretty panicked with being unable to get the car out, and while backing scraped the bumper of the rental and that just made it worse. Finally a Spaniard took pity on us and directed Torry out. Torry was worried that we would be billed hugely for the scrape, or that the clutch was damaged, and he was dark and totally unwilling to have a good time the rest of the day. I seriously doubt that it's as bad as he was indulging himself in believing, but it's not fun trying to enjoy a trip when your traveling partner's deadset on being negative the rest of the day. I drove the rest of the way.

We found parking again in Valencia, and it was nice being in a large city again. I have to say, I do enjoy cities with subways, because they just sort of make a city feel like it has a lot more options. I feel like a city's only a big city when you have to take the subway to get from place to place, because that means that it's spread beyond a size possible to know comprehensively. Valencia's a destination city, though, so there were lots of out tourists crowding the market and cathedral and cafes. We walked ourselves exhausted again, but there were a lot of beutiful buildings to see. It seems to be a Valencian tradition to make domes out of blue tiles, which made the skyline of the city very attractive.

We were ready to leave Valencia a few days later, though, since it's hard living in a hotel for too long, really unable to relax fully like at home. We drove to Yecla, which is the smallest official wine region in Spain. After tasting in Napa, this place was a change. It was so informal, with people just walking around the winery and chatting with random workers. The guy who gave us some wine tastes could not have been less interested in doing so. He wasn't unpleasant or negligent, he just did not care at all, and it was really nice to feel like I was talking with some wine guy instead of someone trying to sell me wine. I really don't think he could have been less concerned about whether I bought anything. Several old men came and filled up empty containers of wine too, which was interesting to see. I bought a case of wine. It's me after all.

The last day I went to Alpujarras, the mountains between Almería and Granada. They are famous for being not only very beautiful, but historic, because this was the last part of Spain to be home to the Islamic Moors. They were banished much later than other communities, because they had been hiding more or less in the hills where it was easier to ignore them. Even now the towns up there are very Moorish, with alley like streets, water fountains everywhere, and people with darker skin and using lots of Moorish loan words. It was a bit rainy, so I'd like to go back in a few weeks when the weather was nicer, but it was good all the same.

After returning the car, I got home about about 9:00 PM and was really ready to just go back to making my own food and sleeping in my own bed. But I guess that's how all traveling ends, more or less. All in all a good trip.

Post Las Negras Weekend

2010-02-22T00:05:00.000-08:00

I have returned from my weekend in Las Negras, volunteer tutoring English for a free room and board at a hotel in the Cabo de Gata natural park near Almería. It was a long weekend, but an interesting one as well.

Friday morning I trudged through the rain about 25 minutes to the language school organizing the event and caught a ride to the resort with some of the staffers also going. There were 15 Spaniards and 15 English speakers at the hotel, and the plan was for us all to talk and have meals together and do some planned activities. Most hours were just one-on-one sessions between people, but others were group discussions and mock presentations. The Spaniards all had moderate English. They were challenged to convey complex thoughts, and most of them were about 27 - 40. Luckily we had the whole hotel (it wasn't huge, obviously), which was about 3 minutes walk from the water, and Las Negras itself is just a tiny town that you can completely walk around in about 40 minutes. It was the first time that the school had organized an event like this, so it was interesting seeing what decisions they made and how prepared they were for what happened.

Specifically, the weekend went from good, to tired, to exhausted, to a bit ridiculous. All Friday afternoon and night people were good about speaking English and trying hard. All Saturday people were tired from the efforts of speaking in a difficult language and for hour after hour. Sunday people were so checked-out of the project that lunch devolved into group discussions of lewd language with drinks passed all around, the program organizers trying and failing to maintain discipline, no easy task when no one involved is your employee, but rather all are unpaid or have paid. Also, about half of the 30 individuals were committed to staying up late and exploring the multiple bars of Las Negras, so quite a few people did not look and feel their best a good deal of the time.

But there were some good points as well, of course. Saturday and Sunday were fairly clear weather, and I spent some time walking on the beach and walking up the hills outside of town to enjoy the views. The town was very quiet and it was relaxing. Cabo de Gata is really the major natural offering of Almería province, and effectively all of eastern Andalucía, so I've been anxious to visit for a while now. I'd like to go back in the summer, maybe even strike a tent on the beach, and enjoy hiking out to some of the beachs that are a bit of a way up the coast.

Also, because I'm me, I have to mention the food: disappointing. Despite being a nice hotel, there was a lot of fish that was impressively impossible to debone. The desserts were all very reheated and the wine was the tartest vinagre. Of course, I didn't pay, so I'm not complaining, but I was hoping for better. Ah well, life goes on, doesn't it! Still, coffee and toast was free and copious, which almost made up for everything given how much enjoy those here. Okay folks, till next.

Thursday!

2010-02-18T01:50:00.000-08:00

Since Thursdays are my Fridays here, it is a day of much rejoicing. In a few hours I will be free for a few days, and I'm looking forward to having some more time to recover from my cold. I'm mostly better now, but I could still use a few days of not having to bus over to this school and teach the children of El Eijdo about English.

This weekend I'll be in Las Negras, though, which will be interesting. A language school in town will put me up for the weekend in a resort, all meals and transport covered as well, if I talk with their customers to practice English. It has the potential to be horrendously boring, or fairly fun and indulgent. I intend to feast like a starving child. If the food is bad, I don't know what I'll do. Maybe they have a pool I can soak in...

I also had my first meeting with Vanessa yesterday, a collegue here at school who is paying me to tutor her in English as well (I really do speak a profitable language. I knew that already, but coming here drives it home. I don't even have to look for people to tutor, they come to the school to find me!). It was a nice session, because unlike children she's highly motivated and can ask nuanced questions. I also have two intercambios set up through contacts of people here at school. Basically, two teachers here have a friend each that would be glad to speak Spanish with me for English in return. I should start with them next week. Hopefully I'll be getting some better spoken Spanish here soon too.

I feel like I mention food in every post. I no doubt sound much piggier that I really am, but we all have to have hobbies. At any rate, I was going to mention oranges here. I thought it was a thing unique to my trips to Loreto in Baja California in Mexico, where the oranges and orange juice was so delicious, but now I suspect that's a part of the Spanish colonial heritage. The Spaniards think nothing of fresh, delicious citrus fruits. They juice them or peel them and buy them by the bag like onions. Orange and lemon trees are everywhere too. Every cafe, no matter how dingy, has an OJ press. Now that I'm sick I've really begun to appreciate how nice that Vit C fix must be. I'm becoming picky, though. I still enjoy OJ out of a box, but it just makes me feel lazy now. If I want it, why not do it right?

Okay, off to make myself some morning tea. Till soon!

Sick!

2010-02-16T12:17:00.000-08:00

Hey all. I've been sick for the last few days, and it's interrupted life here. I was supposed to travel to Cadiz for the weekend to see the Carnival celebrations there, which are supposed to be world class, but I was just too sick to go along. The holiday involves staying up late and drinking, so it would be especially ill-suited to me getting well. I spent all weekend shuffling around my apartment. Not especially interesting, obviously. I didn't go to work today, either, but I'll be back on the job tomorrow I expect.

Otherwise there just isn't that much to report. It's been rainy again here, and the Spaniards complain about the unseasonable cold and rain, which seems reasonable to me, but certainly worse that I hope for in the south of Spain. It's just so much worse that none of the houses have insulation or central heating. Normally that's not such a bad thing, but this year it would be nice to have some heat to sit around. Ah well, I survive.

My roommate, Steve, has become even chillier, though. We already barely spoke, but it's reached new levels. He's still always polite and even cheery when we speak, but it's moved from him not saying a word to me unless I'm right next to him, to him not saying a world unless I specifically talk to him first. He spends all his time in his room, so I really do feel like I'm living alone almost all the time. It's a bit disconcerting. I think he's just ready to leave Almeria and has no interest in investing himself in making new friends here. Ah well.

But hearing about Spain's got to be a lot more interesting than my day to day gripeings. Other observances about my time abroad recently include the observation that going to the open air market is best right before it closes, since the stall are still full of produce that the vendors need to get rid of, so you can get great deals. I'm looking forward to this Thursday, when I think I'll go out for tapas with some Spaniards I've been getting to know the last month or so. It's nice to finally be able to hold a decent conversation, if still lacking much of the time.

Okay, time to go, but till soon!

Granada and Fulbright!

2010-02-01T00:30:00.000-08:00

I have returned from Granada. Torry and I had a good time in the city, where he lived last year and generously showed me around this trip. We arrived Friday morning by a two and a half hour train and checked into our hostel. At 16€ a night it was highly reasonable, but the extablishment was really new, just since September, so most fixtures were gleaming and new.

Granada itself is an interesting city. As a major city in the Islamic occupation of Spain, it was a Moorish city for 800 years, and a capital for the last 250 or so, I believe. As such, it has lots of very non-European looking architecture, with tiny streets in some neighborhoods and lots of fountains in the Moorish style. Additionally, because it's inland the sky is clear and known for its beautiful blue. Torry and I hiked up to a famous viewpoint, the Mirador de San Nicolas, and watched the sun set over the Alhambra, which is a massive Moorish fort, palace and garden covering a hill in the central portion of the city. We later toured that complex, which is a UN World Heritage Site, and deserves to be because of all the really gorgeous gardens and stone carving and palacial designs.

Otherwise, Torry and I went to lots of tapas bars to drink wine or beer and try the food of Granada. The city is well known in Spain for its food, and we did have a lot of good stuff. Of course, being as poor as we are, we also had some greasy treats that I don't think the locals would be proud of, but there have these soups with ground almonds and fried eggplant with honey that I would never make at home but which are really delicious. I think my favorite dish in Spain, appealingly, is callos con salsa, which means tripe in a sauce. I really like the texture, and dipping bread in the tomato sauce that it routinely comes in. Torry says I'm going to get gaut, but I refuse to become afraid of eating any identifiable part of an animal like so much of my generation.

And we slept well too, because we walked all over. Granada is smallish, but dense. There are churches everywhere, and we traversed the whole city a few times before heading out, once, to an old monestary that was also very beautiful with it's gilt walls and high alter. It's impressive to think of all the centuries it took to build the largest cathedrals in Europe. I really never get tired of looking at them. Granada really was a great city, and I enjoyed going a lot. It's nice to be home, though, and cook my own meals. I suppose it's the same whenever you travel.

Also, my application to the Fulbright program was selected at the national level to be forwarded to the German Fulbright Commission for final review. I still have to wait a few months for the final word, but if I'm selected than I get transport to, plus room and board in, Berlin. I'll still have to apply to the University there, but there are no tuition fees, so I hope that a year to two years in Berlin will be offered to me soon. Very exciting.

Till soon!

I have adapted to the long lunch

2010-01-27T00:08:00.000-08:00

I really have adapted to the long lunch. I didn't realize quite how quick my meals in the States were getting, but now I realize how long I can eat a meal if I have some free time. In the states I'd be likely to sautee veggies and maybe meat and put it over noodles and just say that's a meal. Here, though, I've instinctively transitioned to four course modle: vegetable dish - main dish - cheese and olives course - dessert. If I had soup, I'd do that too. Maybe I should make some soups...

At any rate, unless I really am rushed, I will make a salad or steam or sautee vegetables (usually peppers, onions, eggplant or cauliflower), then have some dish with eggs or fish, usually potatoes too, then I'll take out my resealable box of cheeses and have some with a cup of olives. I realize that this course is highly European, but it's probably my favorite part of the meal. Then I have coffee or tea and a dessert (I've made pie a few times, but I buy the pulverones here, a crumbly cookies that I enjoy). I did not expect prior to coming here that I would learn to eat 2 hour lunches by myself with a book. I don't ever eat more, just slower. It's really very satisfying.

And tomorrow, Thursday, I may indeed be quite busy. Antonio, whom I met last Friday, is going out with a bunch of his amigos for tapas and a night out. Thursday's a fairly large night to go out on the town here. I'm curious to see how well I'll manuver the group of strangers. Spaniards always talk faster in groups, so it'll be even tougher. Before that there's a 3€ movie showing that I'd like to go to. I enjoy movies so much, and with subtitles I think I can understand what's going on just fine, since the dialog will still lose me all the time. I'll invite Spaniards on my "to call" list and see what happens.

Otherwise I really do just have very little to report at this exact second. Spain continues to be a very interesting place, but I find my mind fixating on the prospect of coffee, and that is making me a poor writer. To you, my friends, I apologize. Still, I think you understand, and until soon. Coffee bekons.

Oh, but just as a parting statement: Spanish coffee is subpar. It's cheap, like 1€ a pound in the supermercado, but it's really lightly toasted and can't be made into decent American style brewed coffee. The use the stove top pressured modles that take out only the strongest cup of coffee which has to be diluted with milk. I've given up asking Spaniards where the best coffee is, because I realize now that they just think of coffee as something that doesn't change café to café. It would be like asking an American which place serves the best milk, or serves the best syrup for pancakes. They don't see it as something that can be made exceptionally well. Disappointing to say the least. But it is cheap, and it is coffee. Adios.

Photos again!

2010-01-24T14:00:00.000-08:00

1) This photo is of our school bus driver having a beer for lunch before driving us all back to Almeria. Just thought I'd toss that one in. Incidentally he refused the free tapa with his beer. Watching his weight perhaps?

2) This is a photo of Sohroosh and me in Pamplona, a city in the north of Spain famous for the running of the bulls, which is in June and therefore didn't impact my visit much. Sohroosh showed me all around the city and tried with more than polite effort to stop me from buying him tapas. We're in front of an old entry gate into the walled city, which taken from this angle seems to elongate me strangely. Pamplona was a very pretty city, and much more "European" looking than Almeria, which seems a bit... dustily of more undeveloped roots.

Photos!

2010-01-24T13:40:00.001-08:00

Heyo all! Here are some photos of me in Spain.

It's taking a while to load them here at Torry's house, but this is a photo of Torry, Jason and I in Segovia, a small city not far north of Madrid. It has the largest existing Roman viaduct, which cuts through the center of the city and is really a sight to see, just because it's so tall. It's striking to realize that it was build by hand, 2000 years before, without mortar. My hair is still long in this photo, but I've had it cut since then. The tower in the background is the castle of the city. It's very beautiful and full of art depicting saints killing Moors and freeing Spain from Islam. Gruesome.

The other photo is of Erina and our Christmas dinner. As I mentioned in a previous post, we had quite a feast. Stuffed chicken, mashed potatoes with leek, pepper and tomato salad, cheeses, olives, pies, cookies, sweets. We had seconds, but it was almost for form's sake given how full we were. I really just can't eat like I used to. Of course, 23 puts me at just about full transition to matured metabolism, I suppose. It was raining like biblical punishment outside, though. We watched "It's a Wonderful Life" the same day. I'd never seen it, but it deserves to be a classic.

Dactylopterus volitans

2010-01-21T00:33:00.000-08:00

One thing worth commenting on in Almería is the fish. Baby, this town is full up of fish. At the stores and restaurants there's always just a huge seafood selection, some of which I've only heard of in English, many of which I've never even heard of in English. Fish like sole and rape I had never tried, but here have.

Yesterday, when I was at the grocery store, I saw there was a special on fresh "chicharra," so I bought one. This attractively named fish means cicada in English, probably because it has fairly large fins with transparent ends that are really bright. Apparently in English it's a "flying gurnard," which is new to me. I'm in the habit of splaying the fish in half and baking it dry, and thus am the only person in Spain preparing fish this way. I think the Spanish really only fry or grill fish, at least as far as I can see, unless it's ground into something else. I really did enjoy the fish, though. I didn't have any lemon, but I ate it without oil or salt and it was perfectly delicious. The dish might also be benefitting from my increasing fish prep skills, since I'm beginning to reliably cook fish to that sliver of a time period between raw and dried out.

But, on this subject, I've also eaten cazón several times, which I found out afterward is a type of small shark that lives world wide in schools. They eat breams here too, which I think are called porgies in the States. There's lots of sea bass and more than anything cod. Add on top of that the squid and octopus and this is just a fruit of the sea wonderland for anyone interested. Actually, baby squid is a speciality here, where they serve twenty or so battered and fried fish. Everything comes with lemon and usually with garlic mayo too. It's all cheap as sin besides. I bought a whole chicharra and a half pound of squid, easily over a pound total, but about 1€, so $1.50? Highly affordable.

Otherwise, this weekend should be good I think (and it starts in a few hours, since I don't work Fridays). There's a bit of a social backlog I've developed out of nowhere through friends of people, a few chance encounters, and through couchsurfing online. I don't really know what I'll do, but I imagine tapas will be involved, especially since this post has got them on my mind.

I've also been running for the last week. I miss biking pretty badly, but there's just such poor road infrastructure here, and bikes seem so expensive. It had been so long since I really had some good exercise, though, that I just went out for a run and it was really nice. Of course I was out of shape and only ran 20 or 25 minutes, but it was enough to get my heart pumping well and wake up sore the next morning. In just one week I feel better though. I really do feel a lot better the next day if I exercise beforehand. It helps that I live right on the beach, though, because I can run on the pavement or sand as I choose. There are no streets to cross and there's the waves to watch and listen to. I see lots of people running on the beach, though most of them look like foreigners.

Okay. It's time for some coffee. Good day American chums, and till next!

Monday

2010-01-18T00:30:00.000-08:00

Random spot of good news. A language school in town is recruiting native English speakers to spend an all expenses paid trip to a beach side resort (in February, it's true, but it'll already be a lot warmer by then). The work is 10 hours a day of talking, only in English, to Spanish professionals who want to learn English. I already signed up, so unless something goes wrong I'll spend the last weekend in Feb sipping free drinks (specifically listed as covered), three meals and a free room as well. The resort is called "Las Negras," incidentally, and is on the Cabo de Gata coast here, which is the major tourist attraction of the whole of eastern Andalucía, because it's one of the few undeveloped portions of Spain period, but a particularly beautiful one given the unspoiled beaches and migratory flamengos. Still six weeks away, but I'm excited.

My travel plans for the rest of break are also coming into focus. During Semana Santa, the week leading up the Easter, is really a 10 day vacation for me when surrounding weekends are included. I'm fairly certain now that I'll rent a car and drive west to Portugal, then return to see the celebrations in Sevilla. I maintain a probably misguided desire to visit Gibralter, even though I read that it's become a tourist trap in modern times. There's just so much good history there, though. Johanna has expressed strong interest in coming, so we'll see if there's any sort of conflict regarding where to go. There's a long weekend early in March too, when I think Torry (my best amigo here, from Idaho) and I will go to Alicante and Valencia. Despite getting off to a slow start, I think I'm going to see a lot more of at least souther Iberia than seemed likely to be the case even a few weeks ago.

I also bought clothes here recently, as I've been meaning to for about two years. For some reason shopping for clothes just seems so difficult to find time for. They have steep sales here, though, and the pennypincher in me rose to overpower the apathy. I've found that Spanish clothes, and probably all European for that matter, are just enough tighter to be noticeable, but little enough to overlook too. A discount jacket and slacks later and I feel high Euro. I wish I could say they all fit "better," but I'm just too tall here, so as usual the pants are a bit baggy so that they'll be long enough to. Riviting new, right? Sorry for the highly domestic digression.

The two things on my mind right now, though, as goals for the coming weeks are 1) a bike, and 2) calling in some of the social offers that have come my way these last six or seven weeks. I want to bike because I really miss the exercise, because I miss being able to explore tens of kilometers easily on the weekend, and because this country is really good cycling country. Now that it's drier, I could really visit some interesting towns. As for calling people, I've been spending time getting to know other people in my program, and getting to know my coworkers, but I'm beginning to feel like I just don't have the contact with locals I would like. Some of my coworkers have siblings living near me, though, and it would be nice to to know a few more people I could get a coffee with. We'll see how it goes.

Update done for now (I have to do some more studying. I try to study every morning and every night, since I seem to focus best then. During the day I feel like I should be out doing something). I guess my last comment will be about food, since I'm sure 50% of my comments already are. My tomato and bell pepper consumption have really just gone through the roof. I'm really sure I average at 7, probably more like 10 bell peppers a week. They're huge, cheap, and deliciously sweet here. I put them in everything, highly salted like the Spaniards. Tomatoes I buy 25 cents to the kilo and don't even value like I do in the States, where they can be indulgent. Here they're like onions, like water almost. On the verge of not seeming to cost anything. I can eay a pound a day for about a dime. In case anyone out there was worrying, though, rest assured I eat very healthily. I have meat when I'm out with people, but at home it's veggies, potatoes, cheese, beans and wine.

Till soon friends, miss you much!

The Spanish are...

2010-01-14T01:19:00.001-08:00

... a social people. More so than Americans, generally, I think. Americans love togetherness and community as well, of course, but here there really is a comforting as well as potentially sufficating entitiledness to being social. This also means that because people interact more socially in none explicitly social places, like work, there is no end to gossip. Add to that the fact that Ana, my boss, is the biggest gossip I may ever have seen, she is worthy of note.

Ana is very nice, and very considerate, and seems also to be a very hard worker. I do like her. But I'm absolutely sure she talks about me when I'm not around. I'm sure, because why would I be the one exception? She says critical things, frustrated things, endearing things, sly things. Her hands pinch or open, her arms flail or brace. She's a really visual talker, and so is more Spanish than the Spanish as far as I can tell.

This becomes funny when she has to deal with someone regularly that she doesn't like, because each interaction more or less assures chattiness the rest of the day. I had a mild tiff with an Englishwoman the other day that displayed this. The English woman has a child in our school and drops her off everyday. The woman talks to Ana, who is head of the English curriculum here, in the most neo-colonialist manner, always starting sentences with "well the people here" or "at least in this country" to complain about Spain. At any rate, to make conversation Ana asked if it was acceptable to say "twenty-ten" for the current year, or if "two thousand ten" was better. The English woman launched into an explanation of the power "twenty-ten" has as a marker of low class misuse of the English language. Ana called me over, though I was close enough to have heard the conversation. I didn't want to be unpleasant, so my verbatim words were "we say twenty-ten in the States. There are a lot of us" and walked away. I'm quite sure that both are at least colloquially acceptable, but Ana has still not recovered from her meeting with Señora Inglésa." Ah well....

Oh, and plans for Semana Santa, the vacation for the week leading to Easter. Rent a car and road trip to Portugal and back! Olé!

Backpost about Cuenca

2010-01-13T00:23:00.000-08:00

My day in Cuenca was good, if a bit troubled at times as well. The city was dead as could be on the night of the 1st, because apparently that's a family time holiday in Spain. Walking around the town square I talked with an Algerian man who was going for a walk. He was an archaeologist and his Spanish was pretty good, so he showed me around town for a while, which was a nice treat. I went to my pensione and was asleep by about 12:30 or 1:00 AM (and thus before everyone else in the building). My single room was a mix of great and bad actually, since it had a sink, desk, balcony, closet and double bed, all for 14€. It smelled of cigarettes, though, and the place was full of leathery 50 somethings smoking and watching TV. Nice, but kind of depressing.

I woke up at 8:00 to explore the city, and it was 4ºC. I was also out before the town was alive, with the streets empty and all the shops and monuments closed. It was a pretty harsh morning, and made all the more dramatic by a man I saw in a plaza behind the cathedral. This old man, in very nice but dirty clothes and greasy white hair, was playing flamenco guitar and singing. It was strange, because there was literally no one in the square, not a soul. He was facing away from the plaza and towards a pretty view, but I could see his eyes were closed. He sang just so beautifully, and so sadly, he was the best street performer I've ever heard (and Cuenca is not renowned for its flamenco). The song was so sad and beautiful, and I was in such a place to hear it, that I was really touched and just listened for a while. I finally went to pay him something, but when I put the coins in a little box near him, he didn't even look at me or miss a beat. I wandered down a street, still listening to him, but he finished his song and didn't start a new one. I circled back a few minutes later and he was completely gone. I didn't see him again either, even though downtown Cuenca is really small. One of those unexpected moments people get while traveling.

Otherwise, I walked around a lot, seeing all the great views. It really is a very pretty town, because it's on this big perch carved out of the rock by two rivers. You have to walk uphill a while to get to the town. There are just tons of beautiful vantage points though. I also tried to two regional specialities that are advertised everywhere, the "resoli," which is a coffee, anis and orange peel flavor liquor, I had that morning in a cafe. I didn't mean to, but I asked a man to explain what it was to me when I bought some churros (still highly popular the second day after New Year), and afterwards he said it's traditional to have it in the morning during winter to keep warm. As if to prove his point he ordered one, gulped it down, and walked out. The server asked if I wanted one to, so I had one, sipped slower, and it was fine. Very flavorful, but not super coffee-ish, so I had to get a "con leche" too.

The other speciality, the "alajú," is a delicious honey, almond and ground fig pasty, which I asked about in a pasteleria. The woman was aghast that I didn't know what it was, so she cut me a sample to solve the problem. I bought one to take home with me too, since they last a long time and are very tasty. I really do enjoy that firm but pureed consistancy. Otherwise there was a lot of cold wandering around town, and I was glad to finally go when my bus took off at 20:00. It was a good 24 hour town, not a two night one. Sadly, I had to reroute back to Madrid to get to Almería, so it was a 9.5 hour trip with a 1.5 hour layover in the bus station in Madrid. My bus was completely full, but I slept 6 of the 6.5 or so hours back. I walked home, made breakfast, read Tintin in Spanish (I got several out of the library) and slept for another 5 hours.

2010-01-12T09:23:00.000-08:00

Belated check in all. I hope everyone’s holidays went well. I’ve been busy, housebound and underway for the last… two weeks or so. First of all: the rain. God the rain. The entirety of Andalusia, and Spain to a large degree, have been really inundated. On the 22^nd of December a man told me it hadn’t rained like this in 20 years. The next day, a man told me it hadn’t rained like this in 30 years! I joked about what the previous guy had said and wondered if it would be 40 years tomorrow. The man looked at me in all seriousness and said he’d lived in Almeria for 30 years and it had never rained like this. It just poured all day, almost without a moment break, with alternating wind. Combine that with the absolute lack of a drainage system (you don’t notice how many drainage gutters there are in a city until there’s a downpour and the water just collects with nowhere to go). The streets were a sea of puddles, with cars hitting them so hard the splash cross the narrow sidewalks to the buildings. The shortest trip outside meant a complete change of clothes. Also, because this is a desert, the buildings have no insulation and no heating. It’s not that cold, but when everything’s damp it feels more so. Anyway, not the best Christmas weather.

Luckily, Erina was here and we had a great Christmas meal! The list is impressive: roast chicken, oversupply of stuffing, mashed potatoes with leek and garlic, tomato and bell pepper salad, garlic stuffed olives (Spanish addition, obviously), apple pie, plum pie, shortbread cookies, marzipan and coffee/tea. It was a great meal. The leftovers were grand as well. It was a little disappointing that the beginning of the vacation was packed full of foul weather, but the trip to Cordoba started as planned.

Cordoba wasn’t much better in the rain department (we arrived to the newspaper headline: Cordoba receives more rain in the last 5 days than in previous 3 years). Still, the city is clearly beautiful. The Mezquita, which just means mosque in Spanish, in this city refers to a huge mosque that was converted into a cathedral when the Spanish kings reconquered the city from the Moors. It’s huge, just huge, and a great site to see. Unfamiliar with mosque layouts generally, I understand it to be the norm that unlike Christian churches with a long central nave and side chapels, Mosques are open and wide so that you can see everyone else who is praying with you. There’s less of a focus on the central alter. That means in the Mezquita you can wander really wide distances compared to a normal church, walking beneath all these painted arches and seeing all the intricate stone carvings. Outside there’s a patio full of orange trees that are so colorful and fragrant; it’s just an inescapably graceful place.

But speaking of that orange scent, I have to say that the smell of oranges is probably the most unique and distinctive part of Cordoba. Most cities don’t have a smell unless it’s an unattractive one, but Cordoba is just littered with mature orange trees dropping oranges into the streets and sidewalks. They’re in every part and along streets. Just meandering you are constantly hit with the smell of someone opening an orange next to you because of the trees. Well done Cordoba.

There’s more to tell, but I’m aware that occasional long posts do not make up for the quality of regular reasonable entries, so I will keep this shorter. After two days we went to Madrid for the New Year, which is supposed to be the best place in Spain to celebrate the holiday, ironic given how not party inclined I am.

Madrid, though, was just a great city. The Prado (the second largest art museum in Europe after the Louvre) was a great building full of great art. You could easily walk the whole building in an hour, but to look at all the works you’d need days. The museum is also free the last two hours of operation, so that was the plan for visiting. Importantly, the Spanish really do eat dinner after 9:00 PM pretty much every day, really often after 10:30 on weekends, so a lot of bars and restaurants and cafes don’t even open 6:00-8:00 PM, so it’s a great time to visit the Prado in Madrid. I’m pretty used to eating breakfast at 7:30, lunch at 3:30 and dinner at 9:00, but occasionally I forget and get hungry at 6:00, which is the time for a “merienda” here, a snack some hours before dinner. Ah well, even the Spanish know their meal cycle is odd.

I used my Let’s Go travel guide to plot a tapas bar trip. The guide was really hit or miss, with fewer mediocre places, but there was one place pretty much totally hidden at the top of an apartment building. Madrid is just a large city, so unlike Cordoba I didn’t get the feeling that I could traverse it in a visit. It’s larger than Seattle for sure, and even concerted efforts to visit museums, palaces, parks and plazas meant that there were whole neighborhoods that will have to wait for another visit. New Year’s we were in Puerta del Sol, a plaza famous for being the center of Spain, as defined by being the “0” mile for Spanish highways. It was full of people, some thousands to be sure, with everyone following the tradition of eating 12 grapes at midnight (one at each bell ring) to ensure good luck for 12 months of the new year.

Afterward Erina flew back to France and I went to Cuenca, a regional capital of Castille-La Mancha, which itself deserves another post. Till then!

Recommendation

2009-12-17T00:51:00.000-08:00

Wowza. I just wrote the recommendation for the woman who had my position last year. She's applying to MA programs and our boss is a recommender. Out boss had me write the thing and then send it off for her. There were a few sentences she'd already written I used as a template to work from, but she really said almost nothing and it was a poorly written letter. I felt this strong urge to highly recommend the girl, even though I've never met her. In the end I tried to write things I think our boss would really have said, but I couldn't just say great things as a matter of course. If I use a rec from this place, I will provide the letter myself...

Andalusian Christmas

2009-12-16T01:28:00.000-08:00

At school again. All the teachers and students are rushing around readying for a Christmas play that they´re throwing together at the last minute. The kids here are so nudisciplined, though, that I don´t see it going off without a hitch. Still, it adds a bit of dynamism to the workday.

As for me, the march of Spanish fluency continues, and I was able to intelligently ask Yolanda about Spanish slang. The teachers here are so young that I think they really get a kick out of teaching fairly inappropriate words to a young guy in front of a bunch of kids who are experts at not looking like they´re listening.

It´s almost Christmas vacation, though, and I need to stock up. I don´t know what I´m going to make for Christmas dinner, but I´ll come up with something. Here they all have chicken or turkey, which just don´t have the same yuletide connotations that they do in the states. Maybe I´ll make a similar casserole to my mother´s, with cheese and sausage. It sounds pretty Spanish anyway.

It´s also rainy and cold here. Well, it rained for 20 seconds and it´s only 15ºC, so balmy by the standards of anyone reading this. This city has no heaters, though, or insolation. They´re just not used to it, so a bit of cold goes a longer way.

Okay... something actually interesting before I go... Oh, well I´m thinking of getting a bottle of booze and a nice glass for my secret santa gift to Adoración at the school. It seems so unclassy, but she´s always the one spiking coffee before teaching her religion classes, so it seems fitting. I´m a little unsure about whether or not it´s appropriate, but I´m just some foreign kid. They´ll let it go. I´m thinking Johnny Walker Black. Exotic, but not. I´m probably overthinking.

Till next!

Pamplona: kissing Iraqis and buying shoes made of rope

2009-12-10T03:20:00.000-08:00

I have about 20 minutes before I have to help some 3rd graders sing in English, and I will take the opportunity to talk about my long weekend, which I spent in Pamplona visiting Sohroosh, who is leaving in just a few days back to the States. It was really good to see him, and also great to travel in Spain a little bit. The northern half of the country is pretty different from the south, at least within the Spanish perspective, and I think it´s pretty true.

It took me and the two other auxiliars I was driving with about 12 hours to get up to Pamplona, so we overnighted in Segovia, a really pretty little town north of Madrid. It has the longest existing piece of Roman aquiduct, and it really is impressive to behold. It´s so tall, and has no morter, but has existed for about 2000 years. It worked for all but the last 60 of that too, when the water was artificially stopped because of development.

But in Pamplona I had a much more guided tour. Sohroosh knew the city after living there for months, so he showed me the old city and told me about its history. Just the sort of informal tour I like. I also got to meet some of his friends, all very international, including a very nice and fairly macho Iraqi man who explained that in Iraq men hold hands and do the cheek kiss of hello all the time. He had to preface each goodbye with a ¨whoa whoa, getting kind of close there!¨ remark to reaffirm his identity, but a fun fact all the same.

I also was succcessful in my search for alpargatas, which are a traditional Spanish, and specifically Basque, type of shoe made with a rope sole and cloth top. They´re really just fairly hearty slippers, but they took me forever to find since it´s the off season in Pamplona. Apparently the people buy the shoes and toss them at the end of every summer. I like mine, though, though Sohroosh says I overpaid and that there´s no such thing as ¨good alpargatas.¨ Meh.

Okay, the children await! Hope all is well with everyone!

More!

2009-12-01T14:47:00.001-08:00

Spanish update: I continue to settle in. Things have been going very well, all told, and I’m certainly in a much better place than I was about a month ago (which was exactly when I arrived). I now swing widely between having perfectly normal short conversation with people, like the man next to me in line at the grocery store today, who asked me if I was a student and where I was from in the US, and my conversation with Miguel at school, who I couldn’t make sense of now matter how close I listened. It was like he was speaking in tongues. Ah well, I’m sure this is all just part of the process, and any improvement is good.

As for Thanksgiving, I hope all my friends in the States had a great holiday. I had a supper on Thursday and Friday to celebrate, and both were very differently good. Both were more than half Spanish rather than American, and there was a lot of Spanish food to supplement mashed potatoes and stuffing, but they were nice affairs with nice people. I hoped to call the family, but with work involved plus baking I just didn’t have time. At least they had each other so it wasn’t as if I was abandoning them to tragic and unhappy Mattlessness. I tried explaining Thanksgiving to my Spanish coworkers and they were interested. I made us look like a very grateful people, who love being grateful for things, and love being remembering how grateful we are. Score points for Americans?

I’ve also broken out of my post-sickliness funk and gotten down to some serious work on trying Spanish wine. Challenge: this place does not have wine stores. Everyone buys in supermarkets, which is fine, but it doesn’t take an attentive wine enthusiast long to have tried pretty much everything. Clarification is in order, I don’t drink every bottle, but I try years, grape type, and region. That means that while a bottle will be different from a different producer’s bottle created in the same region, with the same grape type, in the same year, it really will be pretty similar compared to changing any of those characteristics. And I remember all this stuff, so there’s less variety than you’d think. Unless you don’t think that. Moving on. Lessons learned about Spanish wine are 1) Rioja really is great. 2) Rioja is not hugely better than other Spanish wine. 3) Hahaha. We sold that same bottle for 3x as much at TJ’s. 4) Jumilla is good, if a little fruity (how can this be cheaper than water? This is mostly water!). People here make fun of white wine, though, and drink lots of beer, so my expectations were a little to high it seems for the wine culture here. Maybe it’s different up north…

Also, I don’t feel like I’ve given a very good impression of my day to day life here. I’ll keep it short, since it’s not highly interesting, but I always wonder what other people are doing more or less hour by hour, what an average day looks like, because that seems important when thinking about more exotic things they do by comparison. I wake up at 7:30. Get a ride to school at 8:30. Finish school at 2:00 and am home by 3:00 Tuesday and Thursday. Monday and Wednesday I tutor kids near by school and get home 8:00ish. I usually spend the rest of the evening/day getting a meal in, taking a walk, reading about Spain and practicing Spanish. Friday, Saturday and Sunday I have off, and I’ve been using them for tapas. Torry, mi amigo from Idaho who’s also teaching in Almeria, has been helping me with that. I’ve only had four weekends, though, so the sample size is small.

Okay, I’ll cut this off now. Good bloggers post short and often. Talk to you all soon. Send me mail! Send me e-mail! Special love shout out to Mom! Generic love shout out to the rest of you!

Ah yes, the school

2009-11-19T02:18:00.000-08:00

I realize at this moment that I haven´t really explained the school system I´m operating under at all here. I´m working at a primary school, K-6, that is part of the Spanish goverment´s new bilingual program. Everything is supposed to be taught in English and Spanish so that the kids are educated well in both languages. My part in this process is to fill in the holes that the teachers here can´t in English, since their language skills are spotty. I bounce from grade to grade, subject to subject, and reteach content in English to kids who really have doubtful understanding of what I´m saying most of the time. I have to teach just the core of each subject, and because they´re all 6-13 years old, I have to deal with their childishness as well. It´s a bit of a challenge, to say the least.

Luckily all the teachers here are dream coworkers. Unlike most schools, mine is staffed by young people just getting teaching appointments. They´re really concerned that I´m doing alright and don´t need help going unprovided, so it´s really nice to talk with them each day. I even get a ride with Maria del Mar every day to school, which is great given that the bus ride is about 40 minutes. We´ve all gone out for tapas and drinks a few times in just the 2 weeks I´ve been here, so I get to see them all quite a bit, and I always enjoy it.

El Ejido though, the suburb of Almería I work in, is really a wierd place. It´s a boomtown that is exploding because of the agricultural industry. Greenhouses cover the whole town, because the great weather combined with a newly tapped aquifer allows for year round growing. Half the city is under construction, and there are workers from Morocco and Romania all over the place. It´s just an unusual town. I´m glad I life in Almería, though. It´s a lot bigger, and a lot nicer. Certainly worth the hassle of commuting. More later!

You know it´s one of those days...

2009-11-18T05:02:00.000-08:00

... when all the teachers pass each other in the halls saying ¨cervesa. Dos.¨ We´re all going for drinks in a few minutes now that school is over. I don´t know what got into the kids today, but they were terrors! I was so frustrated. I´d yell for them to be quiet, and they´s give me a second before getting super annoying again. 6 hours have made me want to go nun-with-a-ruler on them, seriously. Four kids will make teaching a class of 20 impossible! Grrrrr. Some get so sad when we teachers are distracted, too. They really do want to learn something, but there are shouting others. More later. Beer now.

Delayed post

2009-11-17T00:39:00.000-08:00

After a significant delay getting access to internet, as well as an adaptor for European electrical outlets, I have managed to write this entry at home. Torry, another teacher in my program who lives around the block, has solved both issues by loaning me an extra adaptor and letting me use his house’s internet. Bueno.

I’ve been up to a lot since my last entry. I’ve met some other auxiliars, which is really nice since they need some friends too and I’ve been suffering a little from social isolation here, really just not knowing a soul outside my roommate, who has a whole life that keeps him away from the apartment, in which we often pass like ships in the night when we’re both tired and don’t feel like talking. I’ll throw up some pictures of my place soon.

As for Almeria, this place is really nice in my opinion. I sunned on the beach yesterday, which was pretty novel in November. I’m really loving the tapas culture here, which I was really meant for (like so many others). You sit down, buy a glass of wine, and they give you a list of 20 – 50 items that you just get to choose from. They have a lot of fried fish and tiny sandwiches, but they all tend to be really appetizing. The tradition is to go from place to place, visiting three or five in the two hours or so that tapas bars are really rolling, which is till midnight. It’s possible to go in earlier, as any non-Spaniard would, hoping for supper before 10:00 PM, but it’s like private service because no one else is there…

At school I’m pretty happy too, because the other teachers are all super helpful and really nice. They’re always asking if I need anything and including me in things, like pastries in coffee on breaks and asking about whether I’ve been busy on the weekends and asking if I want to do this or that with them. They’re all pretty young too, mostly twenty-somethings, so it’s really a very nice community.

Today was also my first day of tutoring, which was pretty good. I was a little nervous about teaching kids who only really understand a language I myself am pretty poor in, but I did alright, and I have 35 Euros to show for it, which is great. 35 Euros isn’t impressive to a anyone, but it does a long way for me, given my pretty austere lifestyle here. My kitchen is so poorly equipped that I don’t really have any desire to cook half the time, since it’s just annoying to have pans too old to let you flip and egg, or only one big pot to boil in.

Speaking in broad terms, though, I’m just now starting to settle in here. I was so sick for the first week especially, and my Spanish was so especially inadequate, and I was so lost around here, I really needed these two weeks to get into any sort of comfort around here. I’m spending most mornings until about 3:00 at school, then going home and eating and writing and so forth. Weekends and Friday I’ve been getting tapas with my roommate and his friends and walking around town a little bit. It’s not that crazy. More later!

Las Cougares atacan

2009-11-07T07:39:00.000-08:00

My first Friday night in Spain: fun and interesting. The day was simple. I went to the city center, looked at a church and wandered a bit, then went home for my sickly 2:00 siesta nap. That nap went to 7:00, and so I was feeling fairly rested when Steve said he, his girlfriend Elena, and another couple were going out and I could come. We left at about 9:30, showed up at 9:45, and half the places were still setting up, sweeping and moving chairs. That the Spanish eat late is not a joke.

Kyle and his novia whose name I forget were very nice. Kind of loud and brash in an endearing way, always fighting flirtatiously. We had wine and tapas, but I wasn´t that hungry. Somehow sleeping forever hadn´t roused my appetite. Tapas of the evening were:
- raw octopus in garlic aoli
- mashed potatoes with peppers and cream
- grilled eggplant with sausage and toast
- slices of cured ham with chips

There were all delicious, and the wine was good too. They two guys were drinking away, and the girlfriends were taking their time. By the end they gave their wine to the boys and we left for normal bars. I thought I was drinking almost the same amount as Steve and Kyle, but they were clearly a bit more lubricated that me, which was fine given their pliable attititudes. They really enjoyed disco type bars with lots of dancing, which was fine but a little boring for me off to one side. Elena was very nice, though, and talked to me a lot every time Steve went to the bathroom or to get another beer, which was often. Since I tend to go on and on about things and forget that others might need a subject change, I was glad that she seemed genuinely interested in American culture and society, which was mostly what I went on about.

And it was all in Spanish too! The learning curve is in my favor at one week, but it was gratifying to speak understandably over the course of an entire evening. It was about 3:30 when I started to feel like it was getting late. There are so many people out and busy you don´t feel like it´s getting late at all, so 3:00 was like 1:00 in the US. And that´s when the cougars struck. I was literally grabbed at the elbows and hands and hauled out of my chair and into a circle of quite tipsy looking thirty-somethings. Kyle yelled expliciting encouraging and highly unhelpful comments over their heads, and Steve wandered over to see what was going on. I used that arrival to slip away. I spoke with the girls and Kyle for a while until Steve came back saying they were really nice women who were taking English classes and would be glad to have a language partner to practice Spanish and English. I was a little skeptical, but I didn´t want to dismiss Steve´s help so I went over and asked. They were not interested in language learning, they were interested in explicit things that only drunk people say, and I laughingly left with the others a few minutes later. Home by 4:00, out by 4:10. First Friday in Spain...

Week one down

2009-11-06T03:04:00.000-08:00

Well, I didn´t just have a migraine on the plane, I had some sort of bug. I know this, because I have been sick as a dog the 3.5 days that I´ve been in Almería. The headache has weakened, but persists. I´m tired all the time, and it´s really hard to sleep. I´m getting better, though, so no worries. It´s just a bit of a tough was to start the program. I called in sick to the school this week, though, so at least I don´t have to do that on top of dressing myself and eating food, currently my most challenging obligatory activities.

But enough about that, I have more important news to report: tapas are as fantastically awesome as I stupidly dreamed. I went out with the flatmate Steve, who showed me lots of good places. It took some real resolve to get out that late, but it was worth it. You order a rediculously cheap glass of wine, maybe 1.7 Euros, and then you choose from a list of tasty snacks to go with it. Last night´s selection (my first such outing) included grilled swordfish, meatballs in gravey, patatas bravas and oiled potatoes. All of which were delicious, all of which came with really delicious wine, all of which together cost about 7.5 E and were easily a dinner. Matt(hew) is happy, and will be getting to know the tapas bars in Almería well...

I just need some time to get better is the thing. I think I caught to flu in Seattle or on the plane to Newark. I say the flu because I feel absolutely floored tired every day. Going to get groceries is pretty taxing. It´s also a little tough to get any sleep, because my bed is so damn short. Like, 8 inches short. I never sleep in a fetal position, but I´m learning. I can´t even lay diagonally, because the bed is too small. Ah well, life goes on.

Oh, I also have a cell here now. If anyone ever wants to call me: 622 394 648. More later, cathedral tour now.

Arrival

2009-11-03T11:41:00.000-08:00

Holy Mother of God that was the worst trip of my life. But I´m in Spain!

It was alright in the beginning - Kelsea´s ride to the airport and the first leg to Newark went smoothy, I slept all 5 hours. Sometime during my 6 hour layover in Newark, though, I really started develop a headache. It was a pretty bad one, so I took some of my migrane medication, and passed out as soon as I sat down. I had a window seat, so at least I could lean against something. I managed to eat my dinner, and fell asleep. By the time I woke up for breakfast I couldn´t eat a bite. I managed some juice.

Manuvering Madrid airport wasn´t so bad. I had to go through customs and change terminals, even though I had a domestic flight, but I managed it. The process was so pitiful, though. I was shuffling I was so tired, and my head was just throbbing and aching so much - I felt like my head was going to explode! By the time I got onto my flight to Malaga, I was just dying. I moved to the back of the plane where there were some empty seats and laid down. In Malaga, where I found out my luggage had been lost, I had to take a 45 minute bus ride to the bus station, where I took the five huor bus ride to Almeria. I literally could not sip water without my head exploding, but I was afraid of getting dehydrated and making it even worse, so I kept sipping. Luckily Steve had given me good directions to our apartment. I showed up, had some bread, and passed out.

I slept for 17 hours. I always sleep long and restlessly after a migrane, though. Minus three or four breaks to use the bathroom. I feel much better today, but I have this majot residual headpain. I haven´t really seen any of the city yet, but I´m going out for some food with Steve and his girlfriend, both of whom seem very nice. When I woke up this morning I was shocked by the light. It is absolutely clear. Everything is just beatifully illuminated here. I´ll write more later, but I wanted to check in. I´m at an internet cafe at the moment, and will come back later.

Just so we´re all clear, things I left in Seattle:
- the 50 Euros I had from Italy
- electrical adaptor

Intro post

2009-10-31T23:12:00.000-07:00

I hereby post. Those of you following me, I suggest adding this blog to your RSS. I suggest google reader in your gmail account.