Piratas, Pescado y Pisos

Going to get cellphones with Chelo was a success and everyone in our group bought the same cheap red flip phone. In order to distinguish them a few of us went to a tiny little store nearby and bought a set of Peter Pan themed stickers. I got the pirate ship and treasure chest. Words cannot express how exciting this was for me. My phones rules hard. Just saying.

The rest of the yesterday was fairly uneventful, but a large group of us gathered to play Signs and Mafia (games which I was unfamiliar with and will not attempt to describe.) It was a nice way to spend the evening after walking and walking, as usual. It seems no matter how many siestas I take, I will always be sleepy.

Today we had a few different classes, one of which is entitled Reading in the English version of our schedule but called Lectura y Comprensión in other versions. The professor looked like a friendly turtle and very easy to understand; I think I'm going to like this class a lot. The other class was Grammar, which was taught by a Bilbo Baggins type professor that mimed each example sentence with comical little gestures. Hopefully this will be useful, since I haven't actually studied Spanish grammar since high school.

At lunch there was a bit of a mix up, because although we'd given the cooks a list of vegetarians, they were somehow under the impression that the majority of us ate fish, but I did manage to get a plate of veggies instead of seafood paella, and I think the issue has been resolved for future meals (dinner was a delicious soup and more vegetables.)

This evening everyone met up with their monitores (most of them still had to go out and purchase their phones; my group is so thankful that Chelo is a total badass and has been amazingly on top of everything.) Chelo took us to a part of town where there are loads of tea houses and we stopped in at one of them and had tea and milkshakes. It was a sweet little area, lot's of artisan shops with tempting leather purses and bags. She helped advise us a bit on where to and where not to look for pisos (apartments.)

One of the billions of fliers the town is covered in.

For most of us I think housing is the next big source of stress. The University of Granada is sort of scattered through the city with campuses corresponding with different fields of study in different parts of the city, and it just so happens that the campus that I'll be attending is the furthest from the centro and from housing areas that are deemed acceptable. Which means mostly likely I'll be facing a 30+ minute walk or familiarizing myself with the buses. Most likely the latter. Unfortunately. Can you hear my sigh from there, California? Apparently the walk is uphill and in the winter it would be pretty icky.

Anyway, once we finished our beverages we walked around more, took a look at the post office and the town hall, a church and a lot of fountains. We returned in time to eat a sleepy dinner and chitter chatter.

This is, in fact, a mail slot. Yeah, I know, it rules.

Town hall. Fun fact: that horse is hung like a horse.

 Iglesia de la Virgen de las Angustias.

One of about 453328394237 fountains. Don't ask me the name. Please.

I still have a nagging anxious feeling in my stomach about finding a piso, but there are a billion million fliers everywhere so I'm sure I'll find something. It's just a matter of figuring out where the hell these places are and getting up the nerve to call people. It's a lot harder to understand Spanish (especially with an Andalusian accent) on the phone. Body language helps so much.

Anyway, I'm about to look like this guy:

Wish me luck with the house hunt and things.

A Certain Sensation

Spanish singed and anxious, I feel electric. Squatting in the sun, roaming tongue, waiting. The hallways voices reverberate off the marble, sneak into my siestas. I feel thrills, a thin layer of humid air, laying on my skin expectantly; something out there. Bursting from the chest, I feel a split in my ribs; hollowed out, space to be filled.

Church, Churros and the First Day of Class

First day of school! The Intensive Language Program, to  be precise. Some excitement, some nervousness.

Yesterday we met up with Chelo, our monitor for the churros y chocolate. On the way we stopped at a beautiful church, which I couldn't photograph but I did take a photo of this:

I'm not sure what the purpose is, but it looks nice.

The churros y chocolate were amazing. They were very different from the churros I'm used to, more doughnut like, but delicious nonetheless. The combination was extremely sweet, and a little tough on my stomach first thing in the morning.

After we ate, Chelo took us on a walk around the city. There are far too many names to remember, but there was one really lovely spot from which we could see the Alhambra.

The rest of the day involved more walking, more exploring, more heat and food but was for the most part uneventful. Although I did get Skype Casey finally. I talked to Mishka through the computer, too; it didn't look like she understood visually what was happening at all, but she cocked her head at the sound of my voice a bit. Casey says she's been sleeping on my pillow lately, too.

A photo Casey sent me of Mishka sleeping on my pillow.

Some of my wanderings, and my visit to the church (the name of it escapes me) had inspired me, so last night I sat down before bed and wrote;

Irreverence is old monuments scrawled with obscenities and careful stencils alike- contradictory, beautiful. In the Spanish sun, I feel myself glisten with a kind of hopeful uncertainty, I feel shaky and weak as a newborn, blinking into the brilliance of a million new things. I breath affirmations of pliability, inhale and exhale the shapes of new round words, slippery marbles on my tongue. My feet ache not unpleasantly with the beat of cobblestone footsteps, I cross my fingers in hopes that my feet will stamp deep pathways in my brain, that the streets will take recognizable shapes.

In the big gaudy iglesia, I am struck with the beauty and absurdity of human creation and worship. The huge pillars and gold plating, the big silver organs up above, the high archways and marble, so breathtaking and so useless; so much space in a cramped county, all devoted to implausible fables and selective morals. It seems like a beautiful, gold plated waste. I wonder what magnificent accomplishments would be possible if a devotion this fervent was directed at something concrete, physical improvements for flesh and bone people. The possibilities seem endless, and stunted.

Outside the towering wooden doors, the immense engravings and golden alters, an old man stands with a dirty paper cup and heavy, pleading eyebrows. Por favor, por favor, he begs.

When I slept, I dreamed of falling, soft like a leaf, I dreamed of burrowing posts into the ground until my father told me, lights out, kid, and I woke up to the grayish light of morning.


Breakfast was simple: cereal and toast with juice and coffee. I walked with a classmate to the neighboring building, which smelled of clean citrus, and we found our classroom with only minor confusion. The desks were a kind of avocado green with fold-able chairs like you'd see in a movie theater.

Our first class was oral conversación y comprensión, most of which was taken up with our own introductions. It was followed by histora de España, where the professor made up for a more or less dry topic and an extremely hot classroom with a good sense of humor. The last class for the day was literatura, which was for many of us the most difficult to understand, due to the professor's strong Andalusian accent. All in all they seemed like good people and I have high hopes for the next month. Now, for a few hours rest, then we meet back up with Chelo and buy cellphones por fin!

Exams, Exploration and Insomnia

Gooooood morning. It's my third day here in Granada, Sunday morning for me, Saturday night for my Californian counterparts. Look how good I'm being about keeping things up to date, eh, eh?

My last post I ended by mentioning that I had a test in the morning. Some of us were a little worried, a few people even studied some grammatical things the night before, but it ended up being far from what we expected. We were ushered into an auditorium type lecture hall, where one of the program directors read us a text about the magia de la joventud (magic of youth) and the responsibilities that come with it. Then we had to summarize, using similar language. Not too bad.

After the test we had a free hour, so I went to a nearby plaza where one of my classmates had found a nice fruit stand and I bought some nectarines. One of which I ate and was AMAZING. We also wandered a bit, looked at pastries and came upon this lovely picturesque little spot where people were selling tea in bulk with funny names like fantasías de Granada.

Afterward we returned to the lecture hall where we were given a few little guidebooks and a shit ton of information. It was a bit overwhelming, especially in the heat. After the directores spoke to us for a while, they introduced us to student monitores; locals that we are assigned to in small groups, the idea being that they can help us with things like buying phones, finding housing and integrating in general. Our group went out for tapas and tinto de verano. Three of us were vegetarians and we got veggie pizza tapas which had carrots, olives, cheese and mushrooms (which I removed) and were actually not that bad despite their unusual ingredients. Or should I say ingredient: the carrots.

When we finished she showed us where gym and sports facilities are and then took us to a grocery store where they had hilarious little mini carts the size of our normal shopping baskets but equipped with wheels. I purchased Nutella and croissants. What else do you need in this world? (Hint: the answer is nothing. Or maybe water. I also got a big jug of water.)

Once we got back to the resedencias, I took a long, long siesta and then woke up to read and write a bit. Later, a huge group of us along with two of the monitores gathered to go watch a fútbol game in a bar. As we were waiting, a van pulled up and a few men unloaded (drum roll please) my SUITCASE! Words cannot express how much I appreciate all my clothes, etc. Anyway, our crowd was enormously conspicuous and I imagine hard to fit into any bar, so some of us stayed behind and went to a few places on our own. We got sandwiches in a little cafe/restaurant/bar where we watched the game (kind of) and then met up with a few more people and went to a bar. Our numbers were still pretty massive, so it was kind of hard to fit anywhere all together.

The residencia at dusk.

After a drink and some tapas we decided to go to another bar and perhaps later a club, but we split up for some people to change into more club-appropriate attire. My little subdivision forgot the name of the club and ended up wandered around for quite some time. It was an all-female group and a few men approached us or made comments, but at one point an older man literally ran at us and jumped a little railing yelling, chicas, chicas! It was creepy but vaguely hilarious. Eventually we ran into another group and found La Marisma, a scummy little bar where you get sunflower seeds with your drinks and everyone spits the shells on the ground.

Right when we got there, I managed to bump into a guy standing behind me that happened to be carrying three beers, one of which spilled on both of us. I apologized, but he looked a little pissed, and shined a flashlight on me to show the group of people whose beer I'd spilled that I was the culprit. It was hard to tell if he was actually angry or fucking with me, because he ended up giving me the beer... So I guess despite the awkward, I win.

The bar was playing metal when we arrived but ended up playing Zepplin and some other awesome tunes. We stayed until about 3:30 around which time we were planning on going to a club, but for the most part we were tired and no one felt like spending more money, so we walked back to the resedencia.

Strangely, though, this morning I awoke at 8am. I tried and tried to fall back asleep, but to no avail. Showering with my newly acquired toiletries and getting dressed was pretty divine though, and this morning my little group is scheduled to get churros and chocolate for breakfast. Hasta luego!

[PS. Sorry for the lack of photos; nightlife stuff is hard to capture with an iPhone that's all I have here!]

The Journey

It's 11:24pm in Granada right now, 2:24pm in California. On August the 26th. My actual journey to Granada began at 7am California time on August the 24th, and it was not a journey without incident. While I'd love to give an intricate and detailed account of these past two days, other things are also happening or soon to be, and I'm extremely tired. So, here's the condensed account. I may attempt to add onto this account later, but I suspect that my desire to continually update my story may overshadow my desire to revisit the travel days.

I left my house early, battled San Francisco traffic and arrived to my gate for departure feeling confident and excited. My flight was delayed, but I still had hopes of making my connecting flight. I boarded my plane and spent the hours chatting with an interesting New Yorker/Italian with an interest in motorcycles, festival culture, body art and travel among many other things.

The JFK air train.

The JFK airport is big and scary. I confused the terminals, which had to be accessed through air trains which had to be waited for, etc. I was running by the time I got to the check point for my correct terminal. The woman at the counter unhelpfully commented that my flight should already be boarding. I shoved my film through the X-Ray machine in a hurry and jogged to the gate with my shoes flopping. Three woman intercepted me, asked if I was going to Madrid and informed me that I'd just missed the flight while they munched on snacks and apologized nonchalantly. I cried a little, and traveled back through the air train to speak with someone else, try and figure out how to get to Spain and where my luggage was.

The woman who helped me also had a Christmas-time birthday and sympathized. She got me a room at a nearby hotel, some food vouchers and flights for the next evening. I was picked up by a shuttle driver who confided that his job was hell and spoke to me about how we are responsible for our own destinies.

JFK desolation.

The hotel gave me a cookie and a king sized bed. I slept. It was divine.

Cookie and key.

Lovely sleeping arrangements.

In the morning I figured out more stuff and things, realized I was going to miss my orientation and took some deep breaths. I bought a pizza that was supposed to have olives, tomatoes and artichokes but really had tomatoes, onions and peppers.

My first meal since breakfast, the day before.

I took another shuttle, went to my missed terminal, panicked in a long line and made my mother call the airline to ask about my luggage. They said it would probably be continuing onto my destination. Probably.

I found my flight to Madrid, did not sleep and watched a Pirates of the Caribbean movie as well as the Fantastic Mr. Fox. I read. I got to Madrid, was assured my luggage would be in Granada, and while I waited seven hours for my next flight I wrote this:

It's Friday, August 26th, in some places. The Madrid airport is magnificent and modern, full of glass and silver. The ceiling is waves of wood, undulating roundly over big spiked pillars. It feels, in a way, quite alien. Arriving here was a kind of wonder. As descent began, I opened my little airplane eye and watched as we approached little islands of light. They looked like constellations, like candles in black water.

Our approach came with the first blush of sunrise, the blue wash of early morning spread out slowly, and streaks of orange appeared just as we dipped down into the clouds. Looking at the careful scars in across the flesh of the earth made me think of what strange archeology minded beings might imagine at uncovering our bones between these geometrical imprints. What would they learn of us from the structures of our busy ritualized lives?

High up above the ground, through the thick glass and breath, the world looks like a soft place, a spongy glowing labyrinth, the lamplight looked inviting in circle shaped lots. Even the pavement, glowing with the barely born sunlight and stained with condensation seemed to roll out like a blanket.

And then the plane touches town and there's a rough, shaky whirring, the wings come into focus, glistening steel and you are in a world of hard places again.

The airport in Madrid.

And on and on. I finished Ham on Rye and read through three quarters of One Hundred Years of Solitude. I could not sleep on the horrible chairs.

I caught my last flight, with roomy chairs and an empty seat between myself and the small woman in the window seat. I dozed off and was chilly. We arrived in Granada before I knew it, in a little airport where the passengers simply walk down the plane steps. My luggage did not arrive on the conveyor belt. I spoke to a woman, waited in a line and spoke to another woman. She took my information and said it would be sent to me in a day or two. I felt dirty in my three day clothes and no way to change.

A short squat man drove me in a white taxi drove me through the winding streets, past the trees and faded billboards, and brought me to the school. I checked in with a man who seemed afraid to speak Spanish to me and used his hands a lot. He gave me a bag with ham sandwiches, water, juice and an apple. I found my room, found Santa Cruz classmates, bought tomorrow's outfit, had dinner, met too many people to remember, strolled through town and then came back and showered.

Me in my new room. You can't see much but, well, there's not much to see. That bed is looking amazing right about now, though...

I guess this did end up rather long but let me tell you, it was a very long two days.

Tomorrow I have an exam at 10am to determine my Spanish level. We'll see.

JFK

Stuck in New York for a night due to missing my connecting flight. Despite all the stress, all I can think of while in the JFK Airport is:

Anyway, major sleepies, must succumb to the king sized bed I'm all up in. More to come soon.

Last Day in the USA and Being an Awesome Girlfriend

Well, folks, it's my last day in the USA. Unless you count tomorrow morning, which I don't because travel days are essentially nowhere days. Airports simply don't count.

As many of you may know I've been crafting a nifty little advent Calendar type project to give Casey while he awaits my return. And it turned out awesome! It was super fun to make, too, and last night I finally gave it to him. Check it out:

Awesome, yes? It basically a little hanging curtain of pockets, each of which contains a little weekly gift! There are a LOT, because I'm going for a semester but I have the option to extend for a year, so this calendar has enough pockets for a year's worth of weekly gifts. Potentially this means extras but hey, extras are better than falling short, right?

I've preemptively photographed all the items, so you can see how awesome they are. The first one is, in fact, my transnational heart, the inspiration for the poem, this sweet little hanging map heart my stepmama made me for Valentines day:

In less adorable news, I'm all packed up and ready to go. 46lbs of luggage, just barely missing the 50lbs mark! This evening I got to say goodbye to my fambam during a conveniently timed joint birthday party for two of my cousins. Also, since they were having chili dogs, and I'm a veggie, I brought a burrito and killed two birds with one stone; saying goodbye to the loud, lovely Fessendens, and saying goodbye to the joy of Mexican food. Oh, burritos, how I will miss you.

In closing, I'm super tired and Karen made me an awesome copper ship necklace that I forgot to post a photo of in the last blog. Behold:

Stoked! Good night!

Packing is Poopy

Some people like packing. I'm not one of them. Packing sucks. I think I've pushed it all to the last possible minute, too. I guess that's because in addition to packing up what I'm taking, I also have to pack up what I'm not taking to put in storage. Yuck. Luckily I had Casey and Kelsey around; they made me put on all my clothes and then voted on them to the soundtrack of the Knife, which, if you're wondering, is an excellent soundtrack for that kind of thing.

Handy dandy voting cards. Kelsey added smiley faces to the "NO" cards so it'd seem less judgmental.

Turns out the majority of my luggage is socks.

Strangely, these past couple of days have been more or less calm. Rather more calm then the ten day mark, I'd say.  Deep breathing, etc. But I'm still at least a little bit freaking out. Luckily, my friends and family are awesome, so I've been having a lot of fun not packing. For example, Casey and I went to the Jelly Belly Factory on Friday, which was awesome. Everyone should go. It's free! And they feed your face.

Om nom nom nom.

And I had a tummy-stuffing taco night with Karen's family that was super yummy. Especially since Karen brought my favorite ice creams (raspberry sorbet, coconut and dark chocolate gelato, ahh!)

My super sweet goodbye ship from Karen!

Ten Days Till Takeoff

When I woke up this morning, I realized I've reached the ten day mark and it's finally starting to dawn on me that I'm leaving really fucking soon. There have been all kinds of winged creatures in my stomach today.

I'm officially in list mode (more so than usual, even), but I haven't actually begun packing yet. I have been doing the "quality time" thing though. This Friday, for example, I spent the day screen printing T-shirts with my mama, brother and Casey, and last night we had a nice pig-out sesh, complete with berry crisp Uly made himself. Impressive.

 Printing with Uly.

 Super sweet awesome printed shirts. And Mishka.

 The doofiest "fambly portrait" you ever did see.

I am going to miss my fluffbutt puppy dog so much. Any ideas on how to make sure she won't stop loving me while I'm gone?

So Long, Santa Cruz

It's official, I no longer live at the Launchpad. Yesterday Casey and I drove to Santa Cruz and packed up the last of my possessions.

After a year of tossing bags of discarded beer cans and bottles into our decrepit cobwebby shed, Case and I finally loaded up the truck and took them to the recycle center. 

 

 We ended up having $40 worth of recyclables. It was a little ridiculous.

The Launchpad was definitely the first non-parental house that felt like a home, the first place that was permanent enough to decorate and settle into. It's funny, the little things that make a place a home, and how the sense of home can be scattered through a couple of different locations, especially when you're twenty years old and nomadic. 

A snapshot of home: Angela the mannequin in a mask from our Masquerade Madness party in front of a rainbow of National Geographic photos.

It's also strange how a place that was once a home, hollowed out of all the clutter just becomes an old house with too-white walls. 

The loaded truck looked like quite the hillbilly rig, and we were pulled over less than half an hour after leaving the house. Turns out in addition to our ludicrous load we also had a broken tail light and one of the brake lights was out, too. But we got off with a warning and made it to Casey's without incident.

So, goodbye to Santa Cruz, hello Sonoma County!

Goodbye to Sockshop, Goodbye to Laptop

This Sunday marked my final day of employment at the Santa Cruz Sockshop & Shoe Company, a bittersweet occasion. Since a substantial group of us are leaving this month, Sockshop employees gathered at the roller rink for a wobbly goodbye. I even managed to have a good time pulling myself around the railing, despite my vow not to participate in any activity requiring any kind of balance.

In less sweet and more bitter news, sometime after the roller rink party, my house was broken into and my laptop was stolen. Not incredibly shocking, since my house is in a pretty sketchy part of town, but its still strange that it was taken less than a week before I was planning on moving out. The timing is pretty frustrating because now that I'm no longer working at Sockshop I was hoping to work more hours as the Social Media Coordinator for Barber Insurance, which obviously requires quite a bit of computering.  Also quite creepy, considering one of my housemates was actually asleep in the house when it was broken into. Hopefully insurance things will work out soon enough, though, and I'll be able to replace it in time for my trip! Wish me luck!