tetilla

There is a type of cheese here called tetilla. Merle and Jessica came over last night and we ate one.








On thursday a neighbor of mine moved out of their apartment via this ladder mechanism that had a platform that went up and down with his suitcases, mattresses, and other things that would be a pain to move out of a 5th story apartment. I don't know if this method of moving is unique to Spain, or just to urban settings, but either way, it was the first time I'd seen anything like it.

285,406 registered Bimbos!

There was a news story a few nights ago about a new game on the internet where you have a character that you control and try to make her the prettiest, coolest, most popular girl. The prize for the winner is that she marries a millionaire. Most of the players are girls between the ages of 9 and 16. Here is the description of the game that appears on the homepage of the website (www.missbimbo.com if you're interested).

• Find your own cool place to live.
• Find a fun job to pay for your needs and all the clothes a Bimbo could possibly want.
• Shop for the latest fashions and become the trendsetting bimbo in town !
• Become a socialite and skyrocket to the top of fame and popularity.
• Date that famous hottie you've had your eye on and show the Bimbo world the social starlet you are !
• Even resort to meds or plastic surgery. Stop at nothing to become the reigning bimbo !
• Tackle your 104 tasks as quick as possible to become the rising star bimbo !!

Are you ready to become the hottest of hot Bimbos !?!

There were educators and doctors on the news program saying how it's a terrible influence and just promotes low self esteem and eating disorders. The game's creators were on for a second, 20-something British guys, they said they were just trying to make the game realistic.

On Wednesday at school I suggested to Lola, the teacher I work with in the 3rd-6th grade classes, that we do the Big Story idea that Isa's been doing with the 2nd graders. Basically it's a story that the class writes and illustrates, with one kid coloring a picture at home one night, then bringing it to school and telling the class what's happening in the picture. Then Isa translates their plot description into a couple simple English sentences which the kids memorize. The next night a different kid draws a picture, building off the previous day's plot and continuing the story.

So I explained the process to the 3rd and 4th grade class. Lola suggested we do a vote to decide who would write the first page of the story. The kids voted on little pieces of paper so it would be anonymous, and weren't allowed to vote for themselves. There were ten kids in the class that day (one girl was sick), four girls and six boys. It was a pretty evenly split vote. Moises won with three. But what surprised and saddened me while sorting the slips of paper was that, while every single boy in the class had received at least one vote, not a single girl had been voted for. Maybe it was a coincidence. Or maybe creative writing talent just isn't required to be the hottest of hot bimbos.

fluent people and pajama flossing

Lisboa continued….At lunch that first day with Isa and Lucia, in addition to explaining the functioning of the EU, Lucia also told me about a friend of hers who went to Brasil to live in a favela for a year (if you don’t know what a favela is, think “City of God.” If you haven’t seen the movie go rent it). The friend, a 20-something year old Portuguese girl, was kidnapped by the police. She had a black Brasilian boyfriend who the police also sequestered. They knew that if something happened to the girl, people in Portugal/Europe would cause problems for them, so one of them held a gun to the boyfriend’s head (knowing nothing would happen if he died) while a couple others escorted the girl to the ATM where she withdrew money to save her boyfriend’s life.

A few days later Isa and I met up with Lucia and a group of her interpreting school friends in the metro station. From there we walked through the city, stopping at a super tiny fruit/vegetable/beer store for bottles of beer that we opened in the store and sipped in the street on our way to a “park.” I say “park” because I don’t know how else to call it, but it was a small café with outdoor seating next to a strip of grass all next to a “paved” (i.e. white and black tiles hammered into the ground, just like all the sidewalks) area overlooking the enormous river Tajo. It was 5ish on a Tuesday, and there were several other groups of young people sipping beer, hippy types smoking weed, an angry guy on a guitar and two young pitbulls that occasionally broke into our circle of future interpreters sitting cross legged on the ground.

Lucia’s friends were from Portugal, Spain, Poland and Norway and were all fluent in at least four languages. I was definitely the slow one of the group, with my sort-of two languages and pitiful knowledge of the world. I did my best to follow the conversations (which were almost all in Spanish) and not look bewildered when they kept making inside jokes about Kofi Annan, whose name I recognized but only in the “I should know something about this person but don’t” way. On the way to the park I talked to Sara, a girl from Valencia, who asked me what the capital of Kansas is, adding that she was ashamed of herself for not knowing it. I assured her that not knowing about Topeka is nothing to be ashamed of, but she disagreed. But don’t get me wrong, my slight discomfort at feeling ignorant and slow on the language uptake was well worth the cool experience in the park that day. And I was even proud of myself at one point when Sara and co. had a conversation about “consoladores” which I followed quite well (thanks to Isa asking me in January how to say “consolador” in English).

The night before we left Lisboa, I taught Isa how to floss. She had mentioned to me a few weeks ago that she bought floss but never used it because she didn’t know how. Apparently flossing is a novel concept here. So I taught her that night, and she seemed somehow much younger than 28, maybe due to her baby blue matching pajamas with cartoony coffee mugs, or perhaps just how she shrieked gleefully every time she flossed a new tooth and saw what a difference it made. I’d never really watched someone else floss before, and it was a little gross at times, but her pure delight and exclamations that “de verdad quita la mierda!” made it worth it. At one point there was some redness on the floss. I told her it’s normal for there to be blood the first time and we both giggled.

tos

I´ve had a cough for two weeks now. I feel fine and don´t have any other symptoms, so I´ve been waiting for it to go away on it´s own, but people at school have been commenting, and last night it kept me awake a little, so I decided it´s time to go to the doctor. Isa made an appointment for me, it´s for 7:15 this evening. She has a neighborhood meeting or something so she´s going to take me but not stay, so it´ll be interesting to see how I do solo in a Spanish doctor´s office. More to come on Lisboa soon hopefully....

picture links

Here are the pictures from this past week in Lisbon, and also from Morocco.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2064186&l=65526&id=36106375

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2061852&l=19a91&id=36106375

Isa and I arrived in Lisbon today. Lucia, Isaºs little sister who is my age, picked us up at the airport and we took a Mercedes cab to her apartment. It appears that most if not all of the taxis here are old Mercedes. Her apartment is sweet, there are orange and lemon trees outside her bedroom window and an awesome view of this beautiful city with the Tajo river in the background. We first went to the grocery store to buy food for the next 5 days and I took a picture of the Bacalao, a type of fish (cod maybe) that is huge here, which was just out on tables, dry and unrefrigerated. The sidewalks here are made of squarish stones hammered into firm mud to form mosaics, or if not mosaics just really cool sidewalks. The buildings are so charmingly old and the majority have blue, green, yellow, pink designed tiles on the front...words canºt really describe how cool the buildings are here. We stumbled upon a circle of teens doing a funky dance that I think is the *tectonic* dance that Janet says is all the rage in France. It looked like a european version of the thing Laura does with her arms sometimes, itºs really cool, I took a couple videos but of course when they saw me with the camera they all stopped dancing and looked at me. Lucy is working on her masterºs in interpreting here, sheºs fluent in 4 languages, but apparently also brilliant about EU stuff and told me all about it over lunch.

procesión bonita

I ran into Marie Carmen on my way home yesterday. She invited me to go with her and Darcy, the girl from Ohio, to a procession in el Casco. She said it would be a beautiful procession, unlike anything I´d ever seen. She said Darcy was going to actually be in the procession and I could be in it too if I want, just wear black pants and a black t-shirt. I said I didn´t have black pants but had very very dark jeans, she said it was okay, just as long as everything was very dark. So I met them last night at 10:15, Marie Carmen put a black veil in my hair to match the ones she, her daughter, and Darcy were wearing. I told her I wasn´t Catholic, or even religious, and she said it was okay because God accepts everyone, and then asked me a couple more times what religion I am. It took us a solid 20 minutes to find a parking spot in el Casco, even with Marie Carmen´s mom´s handicapped sticker. So we arrived late at the procession and joined in towards the end.

There were two seemingly endless lines of women (only women participated, that´s what makes it such a beautiful procession, according to MC). I later learned that there were about 600 total, most of them were over 45, but there were some young women and girls as well. Everyone was wearing all black -- skirts, hose and heels, or at least dress pants and dress shoes. I was in a long sleeved black t-shirt, arguably black jeans, and gray running shoes. We all held white candles and walked slowly through el Casco for over an hour, and the streets were lined on either side with people watching. I made eye contact with several people I caught staring at me, and had to struggle at times to keep a straight face because I think the procession was supposed to be a solemn event, but I couldn´t help but being amused at how utterly ridiculous I must have looked.

purple and red

Sunday I was walking to the locutorio and thinking to myself that the older woman walking up ahead of me looked ridiculous in her high, purple stiletto heels. A moment later, almost as if she'd felt me staring at her, this woman (who wasn't as old as I'd originally thought) turned and asked me if I am from Nebraska. I said no, Kansas, how did you know? She replied that she lives with two girls from Ohio in the house (pointing) above the pepsi cola machine and that they know a girl from Nebraska etc. etc. We had a short conversation in which she told me I speak Spanish perfectly and invited me to come to "her house" (she said this part in English) any time I wanted to talk. I said ok and walked away, not knowing her name or where she lived (there weren't any pepsi machines where she pointed, just two coke machines and a water bottle machine).

Monday on my way to the library I saw this woman again, in almost the exact same place on the sidewalk, and we exchanged holas. Then, on the way back, a dog barked at me from a second story balcony where a woman was hanging laundry -- her again! I learned her name is Marie Carmen and she works in the Bazar below her ''house,'' and that I am welcome to visit her there any time. I probably will go do that soon, as I can use all the extra Spanish practice I can get, and she seems like a potentially very interesting character, though I have a slight suspicion that she's maybe been watching me or something, since she seemed to know me on Sunday and lives and works on a street I walk on at least a couple times a day....

Last night I was on the way back from the library listening to my ipod. As I passed Pan y Mas (the 24 hour bread store) I heard a man's voice trying to get my attention from behind and thought I'd somehow dropped something. I turned around, took out my earphones and looked for my dropped item in the man's hands but saw nothing. He was mid-30's maybe, fairly overweight by Spanish standards, in a red tracksuit and in need of floss, and he asked me if I usually go out a lot in Toledo on the weekends. I said no, not really. He explained that he and his friend, the other 30-something standing beside me, know two really cool chicas and the four of them go out a lot and they are looking for more people to go out with, to have a bigger group of friends. I was having a hard time understanding them, and asking for a lot of repititions, and finally explained that I'm from the US and don't understand everything when you speak really quickly. Neither of them slowed down, but I was able to get the gist of what they were saying -- the girl friends are foreign too, one English, one Polish, the English girl is an English teacher here, maybe the Polish girl too, something about phone numbers, something about going out together. I got out my little black book of Spanish words and helpful websites and other necessary information and wrote down Ruben's number, telling him that if someday I'm in the mood to go out I'd give him a call, and thinking that would be a nice ending to our convo. But then, of course, he asked for my number. I gave it to him, not having the heart to tell him that I'm nearly positive I won't be joining his group of friends because this is all a bit too weird.

I walked home wondering ''why me?'' Maybe they only approach foreigners, and, as Isa frequently reminds me, my Americanness is visible a kilometer away. Seemed a likely scenario, given their other two alleged friends' nationalities. Or maybe I just look reaally nice, and that's why people in Madrid and Rome always asked me for money and Laura for pictures. Back home, I began telling Belen about my run-in but she interrupted me early on.
"What was his name?"
"Ruben, why?"
"I know him too."
Last year she'd put up posters offering to tutor kids. Ruben called asking her to be part of his group of friends. She'd said no, but he kept calling every week for quite some time. She said she knows other people who have had similar experiences, apparently he dedicates himself to this search for people to go out with on the weekends. So I guess I have a lot of phone calls from Ruben to look forward to. I think I'll stick with Marie Carmen.

Sebastian

Saturday February 2 (cont.)

After the long chat with FS we walked through the town. We

got offered weed several more times,
saw the biggest pieces of hanging raw meat I’ve ever seen,

went to the port,

went to the skala (a long line of canons pointing out towards the sea through the city walls),

saw a fight caused by a drunk guy,

went to two free art galleries,

visited some shops where the salesmen offered to swap their

merchandise for something of mine –one liked my purse, the other my coat,

walked 45 minutes along a nearly deserted beach to a small island where a castle used to be.

We were followed on part of the trip by a guy with a couple horses offering horseback rides to the castle, and later by a guy with a dromedary (not a camel) named Sebastian. The second guy was more persistent, offering first to let Sebastian take us to the castle, then pictures with Sebastian or petting him. He kept saying “no money, no problem,” and though I would’ve been down with a free dromedary ride to the castle, we kept refusing, knowing that in the end, if we took the ride and then said we didn’t have money, there would almost certainly have been a problem.

On the way back we stopped at a fairly classy restaurant. Mark had spaguetti, I had couscous, the food was amazing and it cost a total of 77 dirham (about 10 bucks).

orange crocs

Saturday, February 2

Friday night we were woken three times by singing from the 4-way loud speaker of a nearby mosque.

We left the hostel a little before 7:00 Saturday morning. It was weird seeing the city, especially the plaza, so calm. We arrived at the bus station half an hour early to get seats for our 8:00 trip to Essaouira, a coastal town we’d discovered while doing Morocco research online. The bus was mostly empty. The Berber pharmacist who invited us for tea the day before had warned us that buses in Morocco are very unreliable, they’ll say they’re leaving at 8 and won’t pull out till 10 or 11. It was a slightly uncomfortable waiting period, not knowing if the bus was actually going to leave that morning, or if it really would arrive in Essaouira. A blind man, a crippled man, and people selling candy and pastries walked up and down the aisle of the bus asking money from their relatively captive crowd. We were optimistic when the engine started up at 7:45, and to our relief we took off at 8:01.

Across the aisle there were two Norwegian girls who could have easily been mistaken for British given their accents and level of English. Before departing, our bus was loaded up with newspapers in Marrakech, which were distributed at several points along the way. The bus would basically come to a rolling stop, some waiting guys would come toss out a few bundles of newspapers, and we’d be accelerating again usually before they had the door closed.

When we got off the bus in Essaouira, a middle aged woman in traditional Muslim dress and orange crocs approached me and asked if we wanted a place to stay for 50 dirham per person per night. I remembered reading in a wikipedia article that this would happen – women in this town will be waiting for you at the bus station and will offer to let you stay in their homes. What I couldn’t remember was the advice it gave, I thought it was either “take advantage of this great deal” or “stay away there’s usually bed bugs.” But for 100dh it was worth checking out. So we followed her back to the third story of an apartment building, where she showed us a room with a fantastic view of the ocean and the sound of horses trotting in the street below. The sheets looked clean too, so we said OK.

After lunch at a street side sandwich joint we began to look around town. We didn’t walk far before being offered weed by a friendly guy who, upon learning we were American, introduced us to his friend, a Fulbright Scholar who is going to the states next year to study in either New York, North Carolina or Wisconsin. FS was even friendlier than his dealer friend and spoke fabulous English, and we stood talking to him in the street for over an hour. He did most of the talking, discussing English grammar, Moroccan culture, American history, his cousin’s exorcism, and some complicated sounding linguistics stuff that I didn’t quite follow. But despite how super nice he seemed, Mark and I both had that same nervous feeling we’d gotten the previous day, thinking somehow this hour long conversation would wind up being a salespitch, an offer to be an Essaouira guide, or some other attempt at getting money from us. Luckily, we were wrong. The conversation ended with cheerful goodbyes and I felt guilty for suspecting FS of being something other than an ultra friendly genius.

bulldog clip

Janet and her Australian friend Gen came to visit on Wednesday. Thursday we saw the sights in Toledo and made paella, which turned out okay but would’ve been a lot better if I hadn’t forgotten to add salt.

Friday we did Madrid. We started off with the Rick Steves’ walking tour, which was interesting but got interrupted when an old man asked if we needed help finding something. He was probably almost 70, with glasses, white hair, holding a plastic bag and wearing a red bulldog clip on his sweater where the button holes are. I told him we were looking for “Calle del Codo” (Elbow Street) and he escorted us there, remarking several times about the funny name and how the street really is shaped like an elbow. We came out on a plaza, which he gave us the history of in a mixture of Spanish and French. He explained that he would love to stay with us all day and show us around, but he had just bought an old iron and someone was coming to pick it up between 12 and 2, so he had to be going. Then he walked with us one more block to show us a church and a monument to victims of a bombing that occurred on the current king’s grandparent’s wedding day. But then he really had to be going, so he told us we were charming and left.

We continued on to the Royal Palace. Janet and Gen went in; I stayed outside and read and overheard an American man looking for a port-o-potty in the space between the Palace and Cathedral. After the Palace we went to Retiro Park where Janet and I found some really unique playground equipment and played on it while Gen read on a bench nearby, probably embarrassed to be with us.

Friday, February 1 (continued)

That afternoon Mark and I walked through the Souk, an enormous covered market area. As we came out of the Souk and were looking for the Ben Yussef museum, a boy approached and asked what we were looking for. He pointed in the direction of Ben Yussef, then pointed in the opposite direction and told us there was a leather auction that day at the tannery, which was very close.

So we walked down the street he’d pointed to, expecting to see or hear signs of a leather auction at any moment. A tall guy in his late teens passed by us and informed us of the auction that was happening that day, we told him we already knew and were on our way. His name was M___ and he seemed quite friendly, we made small talk as the three of us walked through the increasingly less touristy parts of Marrakech. After a few minutes M pulled a picture from his pocket of his “father” working at a tannery. It soon became apparent that the auction was not close, as promised by the young boy, and that we were now becoming somewhat dependent on M as we followed him to his “father’s” tannery. We passed an almost dog fight, groups of kids playing soccer in the street, and also witnessed a little boy who couldn’t have been more than 6 years old beating the crap out of a boy who couldn’t have been more than 4 while an adult man sat observing a few feet away. M said it had something to do with the younger boy not going to school that day.

Finally, we reached the tannery and met M’s “father,” who, based on significant physical dissimilarity, could not possibly have shared genes with M. (Only later did I realize that the picture in M’s pocket looked more like a small postcard or magazine clipping than family snapshot.) Dad gave us mint leaves as “gas masks” to cover the horrific stench of the tannery. There were no signs of an auction, instead, Dad invited us inside and began giving us a private tour. We followed him between piles of sheep and camel skins, trying our best to sidestep the mud that was everywhere without falling into the large wells of mysterious liquids. His English was nearly impossible to understand, with the exception of the perfectly pronounced words “pigeon shit,” which occupied many of the wells. (I learned later that a four day soaking in pigeon shit is part of the leather making process). Dad encouraged me to take pictures, so I did, but hurriedly, wanting to get through the tour as quickly as possible. It was cool getting to see the tannery, but also somewhat uncomfortable because of the lurking sensation that there would be a demand for money at the end of this unrequested tour. After ten minutes or so, we left the walls of the tannery and Dad dropped us off at a leather shop. Bags, shoes and poufs surrounded us as we politely explained to the salesman that we weren’t in the market for leather. He gave us the typical incongruent farewell, saying “have a nice day,” but with a tone of disappointed annoyance in his voice and face.

I thought maybe that was it, the tour was just a build up to the leather store, where they hoped you’d buy something as a tannery souvenir. Dad was there when we exited the store, he said something incomprehensible to us and started walking back towards the tannery. I asked Mark if that was it. He wasn’t sure but said we should bail while we had the chance. But then Dad reappeared and motioned for us to follow him back in, so we did. We walked around more of the tannery. There was one lone, live sheep walking around. The nervous feeling in my stomach lingered, but there was also a thought that maybe this tour was just some hospitality gesture/mild sales pitch, like our two servings of tea that morning.

That thought was quickly driven away by M, who was standing outside the tannery when we left again. He told us to give something to Dad, and suggested 150dh (approx $21). He kept saying that his dad was the boss, and for this reason we had to give him something, but it wasn’t for him, it was for the workers inside. I protested, saying that he hadn’t said anything about money before. Again he replied with “but he’s the boss, you have to give him something. Give him 50 dirhams.” I got out my wallet and offered 10. The boss cringed at this, yelling “this is nothing!” So I added a couple more coins, a total of 16dh. The boss was still disgusted and he and M both maintained that it was “nothing.” I refused to offer more, repeating my argument that they should’ve been upfront in telling us that they wanted 150dh for the tour, because we wouldn’t have done it if we’d known. Given their level of English I’m sure they didn’t understand what I’d said, but they understood that I wasn’t giving them more money and were pissed. The boss ended up taking the 16 dirhams and walking away.

We followed M back towards where we’d met him, but this time he had no friendly small talk. He took us part of the way back, pointed in the direction we need to continue, and asked for money for guiding us. I was pretty put off by how underhanded the whole thing seemed, how he’d pretended to just be a friendly guy, gained our confidence, then dropped us off with his “father” and later demanded payment for something we hadn’t asked for. So I offered him 5dh. “What is this? This is nothing!” he exclaimed. I told him we were young people on a budget and felt somewhat tricked into the whole deal, so that was all I could give him. “Why you come to Spain, why you come to Morocco if you no have money?!” he asked before storming off.