Spain: 06/15 - 07/20

So I flew into Spain on the sixteenth of June (time change, whatever). I got in at 9 am and my friend Tony was supposed to get in at 12 am. So I waited for 3 hours...no sign of the guy. I assumed he was just stuck in customs or something. I started to get paranoid, thinking he was coming out of a different terminal or something and I decided to wander around. I ran into him as he was coming out of customs. He had spent an hour with some woman from British Airlines trying to speak, half in English and half in Spanish, about the location of his bag. It was in London having not made it from one plane to another. Tony barely made it himself, since his flight came in late and he had to speed through the airport to make his connection. It ended up being pretty lucky for him because he did not have to carry his backpack around while we went to look for a hostal, that bitch.

We ended up staying at Hostal Santa Cruz, which was actually really nice. The woman there loved us and brought us Sangria all the time. And like, there is something to say of the good kind of Sangria. The husband of the woman who ran the hostal was a bartender and he had all the good stuff and she emptied like four bottles of hard liquor into each pitcher...it was strong to the point of being disgusting sometimes. You guys all know I'm not the biggest drinker in the world, but I can hold my own, I guess. But that stuff was pretty darn strong.

Madrid was really, really clean. We saw street cleaners out until at least 1 am...and the city was just great because of it. All the places we went looked spectacular, and Madrid was definitely a tourist town. We didn't party much in Madrid because it was really hot and we slept a lot.

We did, however, get caught up in a manifestacion (pronounce it spanish style, with an accent above the "o"). There were 1.5 million people on this one street in Madrid protesting the recent legalization of gay marrage in Spain. It was kind of intense:













I hear the next day they had the pro gay marriage manifestacion, but the pictures I saw of that were all a little bit over the top...

There was also this one park where we chilled during siesta time that was great; there's this huge of statue of Alfonso X(or XII...I don't remember exactly) surrounded by this lake that you can rent out boats to row around in. But the place was crawling with gypsies. They were dressed all in black and giving out sprigs of rosemary, along with snatching the wallets of unsuspecting Americans. Supposedly, if you accept the gift of a gypsy you are definitely going to lose money, and I saw some poor American girl take the rosemary. She's probabaly dead now or something. Those gypsies are ruthless.

Okay, one cool thing about Spain is that its like a flashback to the 80s. I heard plenty of American 80s music while there, but that is only part of it. The mullet is high fashion in Spain (guy and girl versions) and the fashions are just kind of funky and...80s. No other way to put it. So when you think about Spain, picture mullets. And capris on men and women. And weird clothes.

We were in Madrid for a week but during the time took a day trip to Segovia. The town looked pretty nice but was you standard tourist place with a cathedral and castle, etc. The best part was when a huge rainstorm hit. The rain and wind were so hard you could physically see the wind as it pushed the rain down the streets. I also learned that day that Spaniards melt upon contact with water because EVERYONE, regardless of age or destination, stopped what they were doing and hid underneath awnings until the rain stopped completely.



Oh yeah, and the reason I had such a good view of different parts of Segovia is because Tony the navigator led us in completely the wrong direction and we walked like eight miles around the outerwall of the city before we could get inside. I'm not complaining, because it was a great hike, but seriously, it was hilarious to bust his balls about that one.

And the old Roman aqueduct was in Segovia too. Not much to say about that. The Audi adds a nice modern touch to the photo, I think.











On another day trip we went to Toledo, another city near Madrid. I don't know what to say other than it looked a lot like Segovia. Spain is really into their cathedrals so most of the sights in each city are a little...similar, but still really fun to look at in person, if not in pictures.





When we left the Madrid area we took a train to Cordoba. The city was confusing, we got lost trying to find the Jewish Barrio and gave up and went to Sevilla. Cordoba sucks. Don't go there. This park was kind of nice, but Tony and I found a lime tree and started pelting each other with them. Then I threw a lit cigarette in his backpack.





Sevilla had to be one of the best towns we went to. It was pretty freaking amazing. I mean, there was the usual cathedrals (the one we saw in Sevilla might have been the nicest overall, though), etc., but the best part wasn't about that at all. While we were there we went to this one restaurant near our hostal where the meseros were just fantastic. They gave us personal attention and tons of chupitos de hierba (shots of hard alcohol distilled from grass), probably trying to get us drunk to tip them more. Well, we did tip them plenty, but they hooked us up with a lot, also. One night Tony and I hung out with these three locals and listened to them play and sing flamenco music for like two hours.

The next few pictures I had to scan in and, in my first time with a scanner, some of them are oddly shaped.

We took a train to Cadiz with the intention of staying there for a few days, since it is the hometown of the most slammin' Spanish professor ever. The city was expensive. There were no maps. Hotels cost like eighty euro per person. So our basic reaction was like, fuck this city...lets go back to Sevilla. It was the first view of the ocean I had in Spain.


But we did stop by the beach for a few hours. Tony's got this problem with sand, so he stayed away, but I decided to explore. I found this little rock-bar that led out into the ocean and got this great picture of the shore. Then I slipped off the rocks and fell into the water. The camera survived, but my passport took quite the beating. Now the threads of the cover are coming off and the pages are ready to dissolve. But they still let me back into the country. I also got a nice scar on my leg in a subsequent sea accident, where I tried to climb onto this isolated rock in the water and got knocked off by the waves. I don't have a picture of that but I can show it to you if you want.

We went back to Sevilla and had to find a new hostal because our old one was booked. I siestad and woke up a few hours later and heard like twenty voices outside of our door. Tony was out talking with these girls from Brazil, a few locals, and these two girls (Miriam and Karima, who were both really hot. Bad call on my part not getting pictures there) and their friend Cristopher from France. We talked in a mix of Spanish, English, French, and Portuguese for a few hours (I used the line from MUZZY a few times, "Je sois la juin fee" or whatever the heck it is) and drank vodka and red bull, which was nice. Then we went out to a flamenco bar and listened to some pretty good music, with Juan Pedro, a local, as our guide. The girls were pretty impressed with my tolerance, so we won't even talk about what they thought of "Three-mad-dog-night" Dambro's ability to handle liquor. Karima told me I looked stronger than all the french guys she knew (confidence builder), and her and Mimi called "Tony Frankenstein" the whole time. It was a great time and if it was not for their bum friend Cristopher they might have stayed up to have even more fun. =] JP, after the girls had left, let me try some of his hashish. I don't really smoke so it gave my lungs problems and didn't do anything for me. First time thing, I guess?

After, I guess, five total days in Sevilla, we head over to Granada. The city, like all other cities in Spain, has this weird obsession with Christopher Columbus, and there was a big statue of him in the middle of the city. Nationalism?










I also really liked the street art in Granada. Some people hate graffiti, but I think some of it is far more powerful than some of the shit we have in museums today. Here are the two best examples I saw:



That's my friend Tony, by the way, for those of you who don't know.

Some of you might expect some pictures of La Alhambra...but it was closed and we couldn't go inside. I got a small view from over the tops of the trees...but it didn't show much. We did walk around the last muslim stronghold in Spain and find this cool little statue with waterfall and creek...its hard to make out but trust me, it was cool. All of the castles in Spain have these really subtle things that make them pretty impressive.
















From Granada we went to Algeciras. From its port we decided to take a trip to Marhuecos (Morroco for the lay people), even though Tony told me it was a mistake. Every single person in the city is an unofficial tour guide and the second we stepped off the ship. I was pretty good and ignoring them but Tony is like the biggest sucker in the world for all conmen. This one guy offered to show us around for twenty euro...but Tony did not hear the twenty euro part. So we followed this guy everywhere but where we wanted to go, the hotel, being brought into bakeries and shown a bunch of sketchy goods at different stores. When we finally did reach the hotel, Tony tried to tip him like two euro and I had to explain to him just what exactly he had done.

So later, we decide to go find this one restaurant we saw in the tour book Amanda gave Tony (which was the best gift ever, by the way). This one tour guide is waiting outside the hotel and won't take no for an answer. Eventually we follow him, mostly because we have no choice, as he will not leave. This one guy came up to our guide and said "I hate Americans," but the whole situation seemed very staged and more than a little bit like propoganda to make us scared into following the guide.

So we followed the guide and he brought us to this restaurant. There was a lute player there who I tipped--since he was great--and subsequently was suckered into taking a picture with him. The food in Spain, I have to say, is pretty bland overall, but in Morroco it was amazing. I cannot remember the name of it, but there is this little pasty filled with chicken and coated with cinammon and sugar that is simply fantastic. Definitely the best meal I had on the trip, hands down.


When our first tour guide was showing us around and "introducing us" to vendors, one of the nicer ones let slip that the reason the guides bring people to certain places if because of the commission the guide receives from all purchases. Morroco is busy, crowded, and full of 100,000 stores of approximately 5 different types, so the owners tend to pay the guides to bring tourists to their shops. With the desire of shopping we asked the guide to take us to a shop and we did not leave disappointed. I got a tambuca (a small drum made out of leather and clay) and some authentic Morrocan attire. Tony got this huge robe with a KKK-hood, another tambuca, and a very expensive carpet. All of those things cost so little it was amazing. The guy we bought them from, on the left, also gave us a bunch of free things, like a turban (which was lost) and some necklaces (which were given away or lost).

On the way back to Spain we sailed by Gibraltar. I found out that Spain is still really bitter about losing it to England and thus clogs up traffic on the only road into the city just to be spiteful. They also refuse to give the city as many telephone numbers as it needs and makes calling to or from the city overly complicated. Spaniards are dirty scoundrels. Remember that. =]





Don't ask me if I will play the tambuca for you. It's a multiple part story as to why not, but it begins in this sleeping car. Tony tried to shove it underneath the bed (as you can see, there was not a lot of room) and the base broke off. We decided to buy glue for it later...but it had already suffered a heavy blow. I loved that sleeping car, though; best sleep I had in Spain. Tony didn't sleep well because he thought the other people in the compartment didn't like him. I won't even talk about that.


After re-arriving in Spain we took the above train back to Madrid. While trying to find a subway station, some guy came up to us and decided to "help us." I knew right away he was some sort of estafador. He pointed us in completely the wrong direction and then tried to shake both of our hands. I kept my hand over my wallet. When he shook Tony's hand, he did this little dance and started slipping his fingers into Tony's pocket. But he saw me watching him and left. For all his size, Tony is still a thief magnet.

We left that same day to go to Salamanca, the hometown of the most illin' Spanish teacher ever (as opposed to slammin'), which was actually really nice. We stayed just off the Plaza Mayor (there's one in every city, don't ask) and got to listen to the loud drunks all day and night as they stumbled through the plaza. One thing I did not get were the strange sculptures of bloody dead people hanging above the streets in the cities. Some kind of festival maybe?



I've tried not to say too much about cathedrals, but the one in Salamanca was worth a mention. During the renovation of the place, one of the renovators got a little...creative...and carved an astronaut into the ornate patterns of saints and other godly images. You can just make it out in this picture on the left side of the doorway. I don't know if you can see it, but he also made a dragon with an ice cream cone. The very Catholic locals were not happy when they saw it, suffice to say.


After Salamanca we took a train to Gijon through the most beautiful countryside ever. The hills were so green and lush and...its hard to put into words something everyone should see for themselves. I did not get any pictures because I was on an AVE (high speed train) through the best of it. Gijon was nice but not nearly as green. But Tony and I did have some spare time and made a huge sand castle, something that children in Spain obviously never make. Spanish kids like to dig big pits and fill them with water...they were flabbergasted by the concept of a sand castle. It was interesting to see one simple childhood pleasure that did not translate between cultures.

So the plan was to go from Gijon straight to Vittoria. As we're stepping on the train, Tony says he heard the announcer say no sube el tren (don't get on the train). So against all good judgment, we don't, and it leaves. Tony goes to ask an attendant if the train that just left was going to Vittoria and he gave us the most "like, duh, are you serious" si I've ever heard. Since Tony caused the problem, he got to deal with it. After talking to the ticket counter for ten minutes, he comes over to me and says we're not going to get to Vittoria until 2am (it was, oh, 11am at the time). Just at that moment the bag with my tambuca, which we glued in Gijon, breaks and the drum shatters into pieces on the floor. The end, its over, I throw it away. Tony's only response was "I need a cigarette," and he went outside to pity smoke.

When we got to Vittoria is was great, because we stayed with the family of Ignacio, a boy who had stayed with Tony's family two years ago. Authentic Spanish food, nice accomodations...fantastic. Their family was so nice, too...but there was drama, but thats another story.

Tony's teacher, Glen, was also around (family friend of the family we stayed with), and we went to a bar with him one night. I had way too much Cuba Libre and was a little ill. Now I know why the stuff isn't allowed in the states; the stuff tastes like good candy! A dangerous idea for anyone planning a cocktail party. I considered trying to smuggle some into the states and decided it was simply a bad idea...plus the thought of it still makes me feel a little queasy.

Vittoria was just a warm up before we headed off for Pamplona to run with the bulls. On the train, we ran into this kid named PJ, who's my age and goes to Williams College (he's on the left of the picture). He was a pretty nice kid and since we all had no accomodations we decided to stick together for safety in numbers. Tony and I were wearing our white shirts, white pants, red cinturones and red banuelos, the traditional San Fermin festival clothes.



We bought three liters of beer and then went to this road that was all dancing and music and had way too much sangria (I had three bottle by myself, Tony had four, not to mention vodka and red bulls and rum shots). We met these Australian guys when we were there, Nick (left), who's my age and plays rugby and water polo (we bonded over those, for sure), and Dan (right), his dad. I wish my dad was cool enough to bring me to the biggest party in the world. San Fermin is basically equivalent to the biggest frat party in the world. The streets are littered with beer, glass, wine, and urine, there are too many people to even move, and everyone is loud and rowdy. Image the basement of SigEp only in an entire town.


At some point, PJ got really sick and started throwing up all over the place...the kid was a mess. I tried to keep him from keeling over, but, and my memory is kind of hazy at this point, some french guy came over and started helping him out and it culminated with him taking PJ to sleep in his car. Yea, tell me that isn't weird and sketchy. I fell asleep just about them on a park bench and Tony tells me that people posed with me for photos.

Sleeping in the park sucks. It was really cold in Pamplona at night and we suffered...for five nights. But it was all worth it after running with the bulls. How it works is that at 8 am the organizers fire a rocket, indicating that the first bull was let out, and then another, saying the other 9 were. Tony and I started in the middle of the course and about a minute after the rocket went off the bulls charged into our road and we ran like mad. Someone in front of us got gored in the face by a bull and they closed a gate so they could get him off. I was at the back of this large pack and closest to the road so I had no idea what was going on. However, three more bulls had not run through and turned a corner and ran straight at me. The organizers saw this and opened the gate as the bulls charged me and they veered away at the last second; I literally could have touched them.

There was also some point where I got pushed over and fell into a bunch of broken glass. Not my finest moment. Let's not talk about that.

The other awesome thing about Pamplona was the bullfight. It's actually a lot more complicated than I thought...


The bull is let out into the ring with the matador and a few members of his team, who all have green and pink capes. They taunt the bull and run away, tiring it out.


Then, the picadores are brought out, who are on horses completely covered with armor and totally blinded by eye-covers. The bull is led to the horse until it charges. The picador then bleeds the bull by jabbing a huge spear into the top of the bulls back. This is done three times.


It's hard to tell from this photo, but there is a bullfighter jumping in front of the bull in this picture. What happens after the picadores bleed the bull is that the bullfighter (or a member of his team) stabs six banderillas (colorful pieces of wood attached to long, sharp daggers) into the neck of the bull, two at a time.

Then the bull and the bullfighter do their thing. The main matador usually wears gold.




Finally, when the bull is tired, the matador is given a real sword by one of his teammates and uses as many swords as possible to kill the bull. All the bulls killed at the bullfight required one sword in the neck and one to the skull to die. The bull is then attached to horses and dragged around the ring a few times for the splendor of it all. This occurs 6 times at each event and it was pretty amazing in person.

We left for San Sebastian from Pamplona but not before Tony got plastered one night. I was pretty sober and realized these two guys who we had met were up to something. They kept promising their friends who were girls were coming but never seemed to reveal any such friends. They led us around for a while before I realized something was up. They had given Tony this bottle of mixed alcohol that smelled really strong and was more than a little sketchy. They also would not let him out of their site. I pretended to pass out and they ran off with him, and I followed; they saw me and decided to double back so they would run into me naturally. They kept saying the same "we're going to find girls, blah blah," and I tried to get Tony to realize this, but he was pretty wasted. So I told him to give me his wallet, which he wouldn't do. I got him to give me the bullfight ticket, thought. When the other guys saw this they got a little paranoid and tried to get me to come with them too, which I wouldn't do. The next morning Tony had found his way back to the park where we slept after almost being abducted to some city on the other side of Spain. It was a special moment.

San Sebastian didn't offer much of note. We met some cool people at the hostal we met but they were single-serving friends. Plus I'm tired and want to go to bed, so on to the last stop...

Barcelona. The city was nice and uneventful for a while because we needed a break. What I learned about Barcelona is that they really like this one guy named Gaudi (think gaudy), an architect of very little taste. He started work on this grand cathedral in Barcelona (La Sagrada de la Familia) but died before it was completed. However, someone had unearthed his old drawings and decided to complete the ugly thing. It was awful. The words "SANCTUS" were written in neon letters up and down the towers, which were themselves gaudy and topped with neon bushels of fruit (see pictures below). The cubist representation of Jesus's life added the perfect end to a very, very sad building.




There's apparently an Arc de Triumph in Barcelona, too, though I don't think it is as impressive as the French one. But the funny thing is that when we were looking for the Arc we ran into the Australians we met (you can see them in the picture) in Pamplona again and hung out that night (it ended when Nick got sick off too many Corona's and his dad and mum had to bring him home). Nick was interested in coming to JHU to study abroad and play "a little bit of rugby," but he was drunk when he said this and I have no idea if it was a true statement or not.

Finally, one bit of social commentary about all of Spain. What's with the mimes? All over the place there are these people dressed as historical figures (Cleopatra, Che Guevara), covered in body paint (a bronze cowboy, a black coal miner, a golden gladiator), or dressed up in weird situations (the devil and god playing chess). They sit around all day and people throw money at them. Whats the appeal? I don't think I'll ever really know...