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The title is from one of the songs from Cristina, "Tiempo" by Jarabe de Palo. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcgwAePTNk4)
Well folks, this is it. Probably the last blog entry until I am back in the USA, which means the beginning of the end for this trusty online journal.
My exam on Tuesday night was hard, my exam on Wednesday morning was alright, and I have a paper due and a test to take tomorrow morning. Then I'm free. Angie comes on Saturday, we leave on Tuesday. Having here her will be wonderful, no doubt, but it is strange to think about. Angie comes to Spain on Saturday. Two totally different worlds, meeting. And then our travels begin.
Liliana left on Tuesday. It's very weird to be here without her. I remember both deciding to come to Sevilla Sophomore year, both getting in, realizing we were going to get to spend a year together rather than being apart like normal, and then tackling this whole experience together. A year felt like a very long time. And now it's done. She's gone. I'll see her when I'm in Michigan. Liz left early this morning, too. I met her here in Sevilla this semester, but I feel like I've known her for longer. And now this context, this whole construction of our friendship, is done. Liz goes to Cornell, so I'll see her, and Liliana lives in Michigan, so obviously I'll see her, too, but that's not really the issue. My problem is that this situation here is ending, it's all ending, and going so, so quickly.
I wouldn't want to be here another semester. I should put that out there. In a lot of ways, I am ready to be back at Cornell. But being ready to be home does not mean that leaving this will be easy.
I canceled my Sevici card yesterday (for the bike system) and am giving my laptop to Amy tomorrow to take back to the hill for me.
I'm not sure what else to add. Not much interesting stuff has happened to me. I've been studying literally all day every day, with a bit of packing and getting rid of stuff mixed in.
I know traveling with Angie will be great and the tone of my next post is likely to be entirely different, but for right now, all I can think about are tests and leaving and how bittersweet it all is. This place and the Spanish people I have met mean a lot to me and it will be hard to go. I've never done anything like this before.
Because I won't have my laptop this summer, steady internet is unlikely, so I'll post our travel schedule until the end of July now. That way, even though I'm not updating, you'll have some idea where I am. Here it is:
June 13 - 25: Sevilla, Granada, Madrid, Toledo, Barcelona -- Spain
June 25 - 30: Lyon, Marseilles, Nice, Cannes, Monaco(?) -- France
June 30 - July 10: Milan, Venice, Florence, Rome -- Italy
July 10 - 12: Prague, Czech Republic
July 12 - 15: Bratislava, Slovakia
July 15 - 18: Budapest, Hungary
July 18: HOME
That's it, in a nutshell, assuming all goes as planned. I originally wrote it out literally day by day, but I think this way is safer. I hope you all have a wonderful month. It's going to go by fast.
I just realized that most things I wanted to write in this entry have to do with food. That's telling, I suppose, as the only other thing I'm really doing is studying (Nazca, Moche, Inca, oh my).
1) I was in the kitchen a few days ago working, and I noticed just how Spanish our kitchen is. There were ceramics hanging on the walls and a pata negra (literally "black leg"; the Spanish ham that comes still on the leg, hoof included) chilling on the end of the table, half sliced into. I saw the bulk vino (wine) that Mayte and Fernando buy sitting in the corner in its boxes, waiting to get transported into the glass containers they have (they go through a lot of wine). There were 4 or 5 different glass containers of aceite (olive oil) sitting around and a big bin of live caracoles (snails) waiting to get cooked. And of course, in the corner were some cruzcampo (Sevilla beer) cans, waiting to be recycled. That whole scene has become normal to me, but it is so authentically southern Spain. I wonder if my kitchen in Michigan will feel strange in comparison.
2) Since it's getting unbearably hot again, the apartment smells like it did when I first came in August. Buildings really do smell different in summer, and that smell takes me back to my first weeks here. It's funny how smells can be so closely connected to emotion.
3) On Thursday, Luisa and Eva (the two women who work in the center) went out for lunch with Liliana and myself to our favorite tapas place, Los Coloniales. It was fantastic. Lots of fun conversation and story exchanges. The relationship that I have with them is yet another benefit to staying here for a year. Being able to go out with them like that for a lunch never would have happened last semester. But now I consider myself close to the people who work in the center, Luisa especially.
4) Austin and I cooked both lunch and dinner yesterday. I took pictures, although I'm currently too busy to put them up. It was fun. For lunch, we made vegetable and tofu stir fry with rice noodles. None of them had ever tried tofu before, so it was fun. They were all good sports and I think the food was decent, but Nando and Fernando could not hide their disgust for the tofu. At the end of the meal, Nando whipped out his mayonnaise and meat. It was kind of funny. No one else normally eats dinner in the house, so we made pancakes and scrambled eggs for ourselves (American breakfast for dinner!). We left one for Mayte and Fernando to try, and they both loved it. They had never had a pancake before. Oh, and for lunch we also made peanut butter cookies, which were a big hit. It was a lot of fun and provided some good breaks from studying yesterday.
As of now, nothing very exciting going on. I've spent the last few days sitting around, doing all kinds of studying. I am ready for this week to be done in the school sense, but not in the leaving Sevilla sense.
Just got back from Portugal at 5:15am. Overnight bus there and back, two days in Lisbon, one day in Cascais (a beach town, no pictures on my blog because I didn't bring my camera), another in Sintra. A beautiful, fantastic weekend. Wonderful travel companions, excellent itinerary. Everything went very smoothly. It could not have gone better. It was a nice vacation and really great to get a taste of Portugal before I leave. I want to go back eventually--there are several more cities I would love to see. Maybe I can add it to my Spain road trip that I'm planning to take at some point. Right.
I don't have much interesting social commentary about the weekend. Generally, there were a lot of tourists where we were, but almost no Americans, which was a welcomed change. It's interesting how Portugal is so off the map for so many US travelers. My short time there absolutely wasn't enough, and I'm left with a craving to go back. The architecture, castles, and countryside was unlike what I've seen before. Very unique, and interesting that it's so close to Spain. Also, the hostels where we stayed were some of the best I've ever stayed in--one was even ranked the cleanest hostel in the world in 2008!
We could understand some Portuguese. It's interesting how some of the words are so close to Spanish, but others are entirely different. Still, between English and Spanish, we got by.
Now I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking:
At Lisbon's UNESCO world heritage monastery in Belem. Very neat.
And the tower, also in the Belem neighborhood! (After we went to supposedly the best sweet shop in all of Lisbon. My mouth waters just thinking about it.)
Liz and Amy in Sintra, a village just outside of Lisbon. We took the train there for a day. Beautiful -- surrounded by hills (or little mountains?), cute little city center, lots of castles and a UNESCO site.
Probably Sintra's most famous castle. On the top of a hill/mountain... we climbed all the way up and then decided it wasn't worth going in, but we snapped a few conquering photos before we left! The castle was quite beautiful on the outside and I had the pleasure of using muscles in my legs that living in Sevilla doesn't really require.
I'm a sucker for the "Old House With Laundry" shot. This one is in Sintra.
Amy and Liz in a castle tower in the UNESCO site in Sintra. I made them act like Rapunzel later.
The gardens had crazy caves that ran underground. This is an old well that you can climb down into to access the caves! I was scared. I held both Amy and Liz's hands and made whiny noises the whole time. But I did it anyway!
I told you, I'm a sucker for the laundry shots. This one is in the Alfama neighborhood in Lisbon.
Liz and a Lisbon house. I love this photo.
We climbed up the Alfama and walked around St George's castle. It's on the top of one of Lisbon's hills and had great views of Lisbon. Straight down is the center area where we stayed. Off in the distance is a bridge that looks exactly like the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco.
Amy and Liz entering part of St George's castle.
The classic Lisbon picture: winding beautiful Alfama streets and Tram #28. The trams were too packed with tourists for us to ride on them, but they were pretty to look at, nonetheless.
