February 28 - Lots of Time Outside

It is hard to believe that February is over already, but it is even harder to believe that we have been away from Walla Walla for almost nine months.  Luckily, here in Sevilla, February has been a lovely month and today was no different.  With no class and beautiful weather, I took the opportunity to take a longer than normal walk.

I didn't go anywhere special- just headed south and kept walking.  Lots of children and families out in the parks enjoying the day off and the blooming flowers.  I mostly just walked and listened to music and enjoyed the warm sunshine.

I did stop for a few minutes on one of the bridges to watch the drawbridge close.  A cruise ship had been in port when I set out on my walk, and it had just left and passed back out toward the ocean on my way back. 

This evening, I spent a little while packing.  We are just leaving for a long weekend, so we don't need much.  We are traveling with a company, WELOVESPAIN, that caters primarily to students who are studying in Spain.  I found the trip through my school.  We will likely be the oldest people on the trip by a large margin, but we are looking forward to the adventure.  I walked past the morning meeting point on  my way home just to make sure I knew where we needed to go.  It is very close to our regular grocery store - so a pretty short walk down a very familiar street.

I will not be packing along my computer - so my next blog will likely be Sunday night after we return from our trip.  

February 27 - TGIW

Although I normally wear skorts year round, but now I am regularly back into short sleeves as well.  The days are getting longer, and the bar across the street is full pretty much whenever it is open.

Class was good today - the three regulars (including me) were all in class -  lots of listening practice which is exactly what I need.  Next week we are supposed to get at least three and up to five new students - it is always fun to have new folks, hopefully we can keep the same fun, relaxed, supportive environment.  At the end of class today, we all parted with wishes for a good weekend. 

With the holiday tomorrow, the stores will be closed, so Albert and I made sure on our grocery run this morning that we had everything for meals for today and tomorrow.  We realized right before heading out to school that we should also pick up some food for lunch on the bus on Friday - so I stopped by the store again on my way home from school.

With nothing really to do tomorrow but a little studying and packing, I decided to take tonight off from Spanish.  I read for a while after dinner and am planning an early night. 

February 26 - Fairgrounds Construction

This morning, working on my homework felt a little like banging my head against a wall.  I was doing some work with a literary piece that had all of poetic elements (metaphor, symbolism, ...) that you could ever ask for.  Sadly for me, I am still pretty much in the "literal" phase.  I can handle the occasional colloquial phrase, but in terms of the flowery language and imagery in the piece I was reading - I probably only really got 50%. 

After working for a few hours, I decided that I needed to get up and walk or I was going to be useless in class and then afterwards in intercambio.  So, I headed out to the fairgrounds.  Most of the year, the fairgrounds are just a big open, barren space.  But for the April Fair (which this year is actually the first week in May), it is transformed.  The transformation, as it turns out, takes months.  They started building the opening gate earlier this month.

They have also started building the frames for the hundreds of tents that families and groups will use for their private parties for the week.  I think about it like tailgating.  Everyone is there for the same event but each is having their own private party.  Of course this tailgate lasts for a week - and the parties are in pre-built tents instead of out of the backs of cars....

It will be interesting to see how things progress over the next two months.  

After walking for about an hour, I headed back, finished my homework, had got ready for class.

I am really glad that I took the break because today in class there was exactly ONE student - me.  So for three intense hours, we worked through the literary piece, did some listening exercises, and talked.  I learned a ton and felt good, but it took a lot of energy.

I was absolutely spent - so I took some time to walk around a little before heading in to Intercambio.  We had a good crowd.  Spring is definitely in the air, some the of the students from the English language school played a little music, sang, and danced the Sevillana.  The Sevillana is a folk dance that looks a lot like Flamenco - it is the dance that something like 20,000 people will do together on the Monday night of the fair.  I didn't have anything cultural to add, but I did have cookies to share.

After a couple of songs, we all settled in to practice our language for a couple of hours.  

With Thursday being a holiday here and us leaving on Friday morning for Aftrica - tomorrow is the end of the school week for me.   There should be three students tomorrow and according to the teacher, we will have some new students starting next week.

February 25 - Another Kitchen Experiment

This morning was pretty mellow.   We did a small grocery run and did the basic morning things but nothing special.

After class, I walked over to my favorite bookstore just to look around a little.

On the way there, I passed a shop where a guy sits out front embroidering messages onto shirts, aprons, .... while you wait.  This is one of the samples that was hanging by the door today.  "Born for love but forced to cook."  Since I love to cook, I can't really relate.

Lots of musicians out today - some guitarists, a cello player, and two accordions - just on my short walk.  This dog is always out "helping" the accordion player collect tips.

After the bookstore, I stopped off in the big department/grocery store looking for a couple of items that we don't have in our regular grocery.  Sadly, they didn't have them either - so, a trip to Carrefour is probably in my near future.

After dinner, I made some homemade caramel and then used it in these "Oatmeal, Chocolate, Caramel" layer bars.  The idea is that they will set overnight and I will be able to take them to intercambio tomorrow.

Who knows what they actually taste like - but I am cautiously optimistic.

February 24 - Spanish in the Springtime

It was beautiful and sunny with temperatures in the high 70's - the perfect day to work inside for hours on my Spanish homework. 

It wasn't exactly the plan.  After a couple of hours of homework, cooking and eating lunch, and a couple of more hours of homework - I decided to take a break and go out for a long walk.  People were out taking full advantage of the unusual weather.  Lots of folks eating or having afternoon drinks at outdoor cafes, people out walking dogs, fishermen

paddlers,

tourists on the top deck of the bus,

and bike riders of all types (longdistance riders, recreational riders, racers out on training rides...).  

Every time I look at the pictures of the snow coming down in Walla Walla, I am thankful to be here. 

I like this sign (minus the graffiti, of course) which gives the hours of one of the parks but that as a side benefit also explains that there are only two seasons in Sevilla - Summer and Winter (or as I like to call them Summer and not-Summer).  Summer lasts from April 1-October 31 and not-Summer lasts from November 1- March 31.

With a few hours after my walk, I was able to finish my homework and do the studying that I wanted to do before class tomorrow.  Tomorrow morning I may review a couple of things - but it is nice to have all of the hard work done before I go to bed.

Thursday is a holiday this week (The Day of Andalucia) and we are leaving Friday morning for a long weekend in Africa.  So, a short week to finish off February - YIKES - time is flying.

February 23 - Mudéjar

This morning was pretty normal a little Spanish, a trip to the grocery store, firming up some more travel plans, cooking lunch, ....After lunch some work and a little reading. 

At 5 o'clock, we met our landlords Palma and Mario for a nice walk around the city.  It was nice to practice my Spanish with some locals of course, but mostly it was nice to spend some time with them.  We both like them a great deal.

Palma took us around to her old neighborhood.  I had walked through it before a number of times, but she was able to point out lots of things that were new to me.  One thing was the school where Mario teaches.  It was closed and locked for the day today, of course, but he did mention that at some point he would love to show us around inside.  I hope we eventually can find a time to do that.  He is in charge of maintaining all of the historical science equipment that Palma says is kind of like a mini-museum.

Most of the rest of our walk was highlighted by churches that were "built" by taking over existing mosques and turning them into churches.  She was able to explain lots of the differences in materials and architecture that came from parts that the churches preserved and other parts that they either renovated or built over.  There is a word for this type of mixed architecture buildings, mudéjar.  It was borrowed by the Spanish in medieval times - in arabic the word was mudajjan which means tamed.

After walking for about an hour, we stopped for tea and talked for a while longer.  They are often busy with work and the two children that still live at home, and we appreciated the generous gift of their time this afternoon.

After the tea, we headed home and had dinner and now I am watching a live stream of Whitman Women's Tennis - technology is awesome!

February 22 - Preparing for Spring

This morning, I made a large pot (well actually two pots because it wouldn't all fit into any of the pots I have here) of vegetable soup.  We are almost beyond soup weather as the temperatures continue to creep up.

The work on the building next door continues, it seems that the demolition phase may be done.  They have put up scaffolding and begun working outside and there are regular trucks on the small road picking up loads of debris and dropping off supplies (tiles, cement, ....).  When you walk past and look inside, it still looks like a disaster area, but there is a lot of activity.

Class was fun today.  There were two students and the other student had lots of great stories about her new dog- so we did some grammar, and I did talk some - but I also did a lot of listening. 

After class, I hustled home so that Albert and I could get back out to the movie theater in time for the 8:15 showing of "Green Book".  It was in English with Spanish subtitles.  My intention was to really concentrate on the subtitles, but my concentration was not great and mostly I just enjoyed the movie in English. 

In Sevilla right now, there are lots of signs of spring.  The orange trees are bursting, the temperatures are consistently warm, every seamstress in the city is working nonstop to get all of the dresses ready for the fair (a huge number of women buy or revamp a flamenco dress for the city fair each year- all of the teachers in my school for example are having them made),  all of the folks who participate in the Easter processions are getting their clothes ready, they have started to decorate the fairgrounds, and on and on....

This evening on my walk after the movie, I came across a group of men practicing for the procession.  They had a frame for a Paseo that was undecorated with a speaker strapped to the top playing the band music and beats, they were practicing picking it up, putting it down, walking, turning corners, doing the swaying moves that we have witnessed, and so on.  It is amazing to think about how many hours go into preparing for these Easter processions.  According to my teacher, most of the bands, for example, have been practicing pretty regularly since the new year.  I must say, that the carrying job does not look fun even when you are not stuck in the dark underside of a heavy Paseo - but this has been going on for a LOT of years, so I am sure there are guys who can't wait to be old enough to take part.

The plan tomorrow is to finish our taxes and spend some quality time outside - it is supposed to be sunny and in the high seventies. 

February 21 - Another Goodbye

Today, I decided against attending the cultural event.  Instead I worked at home right up until time to go to school.  I did make chicken tacos that turned out to be pretty tasty - with enough leftover chicken to top Albert's dinner salad.

I also received a series of messages from my previous teacher from her new home in Australia.  She is learning English, but all of our messages were in Spanish.  Easier for her, better for me.  It was really nice to hear from her and to know that she is doing well.

Today there were only two students in class - me and a young woman from Italy who has been in my classes since before Christmas - with Lucia (the teacher who is now in Australia), with Carmen, and now with Beli.  Today was her last day.  I will miss her.  We have each other's contact information, of course, but I will miss seeing her in class each day.

Also sad was the fact that she was only in the first half of class - she left at the break.  That left me alone in class.  We had done a pretty intense 90 minutes of grammar the first half; so for the last 90 minutes, the teacher and I "just" had a Spanish conversation.  It was probably good for me, but it was not easy. 

Tomorrow, I think that there will be one other student - then we should be back up to at least three on Monday next week.  Either next week or the week after, some new students are supposed to join.  I hope that they actually come, because I am afraid that they will cancel the class if we are averaging less than 3 students per day.

After class, I walked for a bit and then went to pick up a few things at the store before coming home and then heading right back out to another store with Albert.  Now, I am in for the night.  Luckily, I don't have too much homework.

February 20 - Evening Life

Today when I arrived at school, the door that leads to the classrooms on my side of the building was closed and locked.  After the computer theft, the doors are only open when someone is actually available to watch students come in and out.  For me it is a sad change - it doesn't really change my life much, I just think of the once trusting group of professors and secretaries that now have to keep their doors closed and locked.

When my class ended at 7:30 this evening, I went for a walk.  Since it is dark when I come out, I sometimes don't think about this as regular business hours for some folks around town.  It was fun to see the huge doors that are often closed on weekends standing open and giving a view in... like the University Building (the old Tobacco Factory) and the Science Museum.

There were also lots of people at the public library.

And lined up to go into the historic Lope de Vega theatre that has been transformed with decorative birds for the Cuban comedy that is playing there for the next couple of weeks.

Before heading to the grocery store, I made a short stop to watch some folks playing paddle ball.  Paddle ball is similar to both tennis (same scoring, overhand serves allowed) and pickleball (solid paddle instead of strings).

Finally, I headed to the grocery store to pick up a few things and headed home.  I did a lot of Spanish this morning, but I do have a lot of homework - so maybe at least a little more tonight....

February 19 - Lively Intercambio

This morning, I made Chicken Tortilla Soup - we stopped at the Triana Market on our way home from the airport yesterday to get fresh jalepenos and then I stopped at the regular grocery store after school last to get everything else.  While Albert was doing laundry, I was chopping, sauteing, carving, pureeing, and all the other things to make the soup for lunch.

After that, I spent some time working on my homework and doing some review.  I stopped with about half an hour to go before school since I knew it would be a long afternoon and evening of Spanish.

I originally planned to walk during the break and between class and intercambio, but I ended up working through the break with another student on an exercise and then one of the other professors asked me to walk a new group of students across town to the intercambio.  We arrived early since we went straight from class, but we ended up chatting for the 15 minutes until other students started to arrive.

The teacher in charge of intercambio invited a couple of her local friends to participate.  It meant we had lots of local Spanish speakers to keep the conversations going.  In addition to the new students and the visiting locals - lots of the regulars were there.  I ended up staying until close to 10:15 - lots of Spanish practice tonight!

Of course, with no walking during the break or right after class, I still had some walking to do after intercambio  - so I mostly stayed on the bigger streets and got in a couple of miles.  The large street that runs parallel to the river on the Sevilla side has had construction fencing up along different parts on the side of the street near the river pretty much since we got here.  As of today, it has all been taken down... of course now there is new fencing up across the street.  The city seems to be in a neverending state of infrastructure upkeep.

Tomorrow should be a pretty normal day.  It is supposed to be in the low 70's and then up into the high seventies for days and days.  Everyone here seems to think the "hard winter" is over.  

February 18 - Back from Mallorca

Saturday morning, we left home on an early airport bus to catch our morning flight to Mallorca.  Everything ran on time and we pulled out of the airport a few minutes early.  After a smooth trip, we caught our first glimpse of the island - there were large patches of fog.  It was also quite windy, but we didn't know that until the pilot aborted landing twice and gave up and flew to the neighboring island of Menorca.

After a short wait, they cleared the plane and it returned to the mainland to continue with other flights.  So, the passengers were now on the wrong island without a plane.  Luckily, they were able to put us all on other flights, sadly they were hours later.  We walked a little outside the airport, but it is isolated - so we didn't really see much.  Then, we ate lunch using our vouchers at a nice restaurant in the airport and waited for our, now afternoon, flight.

The flight from Menorca back to Mallorca was uneventful, and the weather was great.  So, we decided, since we only had backpacks, to walk the few miles from the airport to our hotel.  About half of the walk was in the industrial area around the airport, but the second half was along the boardwalk.  In the summer, we would have been elbow to elbow with crowds of beachgoers, but in February, there were people out riding bikes and walking dogs and just enjoying the boardwalk - but it was not crowded.

We checked in, cleaned up a little, checked out the hotel amenities, and headed out to the buffet for dinner.  After dinner, we went to the lounge area in the hotel - we were originally planning to stay and watch the show.  But after a short time, we realized that the long day was catching up to us, and watching a Flamenco show was just not in the cards.  

Sunday morning, we woke up and hit the breakfast and then headed out for a walk along the beach.  The weather was great and we were able to walk a few miles each way with good boardwalks and walking paths.  We could have kept going, but we wanted to get back in time to clean up before lunch.

After cleaning up and having a nice lunch, we headed to the indoor pool.  It was not big, but it was also empty - so there was plenty of room for us to both swim and sit poolside and read.  After a few hours, we headed up and got changed.  I had only done about an hour of Spanish on Saturday in the airport, so Albert took his computer and I took my Spanish and we hung out in the lounge for a couple of hours.  I finished all my homework and did some extra studying.

We dropped everything off in the room and put on jackets and headed back out to the beach to watch the sunset.  There was a really good street musician who served as great background music as we walked down, touched the water, and then hung around to watch the sun set.

We headed back and talked to the girls before heading back out to dinner and then the evening show.  The show was a Spanish man singing songs (some in Spanish and others in English).  We watched his first set and then called it a night.

Monday morning, we awoke to some early fog.  But, by the time we arrived at the airport it had burned off.

This direction, our flight was uneventful and we arrived just in time to catch the airport bus back into the city.  It was a little overcast here too, but it warmed up nicely by the time we walked to class.  

So, we are now back into our routine.  Some studying for me and some math for Albert - school - some grocery shopping....  We had a great weekend, but it is also nice to be home.

Tomorrow, class and intercambio.

February 15 - Homework Aplenty

This morning, I started working on my homework.  I was not feeling great last night and had quite a bit to do.  In addition to the regular exercises, I had not one but two open ended writing assignments.  These are REALLY slow for me.  I can't imagine how students with English as a second language keep up in their classes in the US - especially writing intensive ones. 

With all of my homework, I didn't do too much else before class.  Class was good, and the homework for the weekend doesn't include any open ended writing.  WHEW!

After class, I walked for about an hour and a half since I hadn't really walked at all except walking to class.  Lots of people out on the lovely Friday night.  

When I got home, I took care of some of the details for our trip tomorrow - getting boarding passes, adding funds to the airport bus card, packing,....  Then a quick dinner and now this quick blog.  With alarms set for 3:45, I am hoping to be asleep soon.

Tomorrow, off to Mallorca for the weekend.  Of course, I will be taking a little homework with me since we don't get back until Monday afternoon.

February 14 - Happy Valentine's Day

The candy shops, gift shops, jewelry stores, florists, and restaurants had subtle reminders that today was the day of Saint Valentine.  Although many folks may think of this as just the first retail holiday of 2019, I like it.  Albert and I don't go out to eat or exchange sweets or flowers or other gifts, but I like the idea that lots of people across the world think today is just a little special. 

In order to do my part, I made two pineapple cakes this morning - one for Albert and one for school.  Since I don't really have the tools to make a pineapple upside down cake like I would at home, I just made them and flipped them one piece at a time as I was serving instead of all at once.  The fun presentation was lost, but they turned out moist (thanks to some sour cream from the Russian grocer and some homemade buttermilk) and tasted approximately like I was hoping.  The teachers and my classmates ate every piece.  Knowing that I would not be able to flip them, I took a couple of quick photos before I poured in the batter....

I left home at about 1:30 to attend the cultural event.  We went to the Museum of Fine Arts (which I have been to a few times before) - but today, we visited the special Murillo exhibit which had not been there when I visited before.  Sevilla is celebrating the 400th birthday of this famous painter.  The special exhibit contains 105 of his works that have been borrowed from churches and museums and private collections worldwide where they are usually housed.  He is most famous for his religious paintings, but I prefer his paintings of street people.  My real success today was that I actually used the Spanish language program to read about the works of art as we went through the exhibit.

After the museum, I went back to class.  I don't know why exactly, but I was a disaster today - thank goodness we spent some time going over homework (which I had done) so that I had a little time to get warmed up, but I never did feel like I was in a groove today.  Every exercise was a struggle.

When I got home tonight, I ate dinner and read a little, but took a break from homework.  Of course that means I will have more tomorrow, but it was good to have a little break and I think I will be better off because of it.