The
older I've gotten the faster time seems to fly by and my month so far
in Spain has been no exception. I feel like it was just yesterday that
I walked through the door of my host family's apartment here in
Alicante and now I will be saying good-bye to them tomorrow afternoon
before I embark on my train ride to Madrid. There are so many things I
would like to reflect on about my time in Alicante, but with it already
being 9:30 on Friday night I'm bound to be called to dinner soon (I
hope...though wouldn't be surprised if I have to wait two more
hours...) so I suppose sharing some of my photos from the past few
weeks will have to suffice. Truthfully these are photos from my friend
Jasmin, but since we spent nearly every day together I feel that I can
call them my own.
Mark,
Jasmin and I during our second week in Alicante. We discovered that a
local bar, Havana, hosts a free salsa class every Monday night. We
arrived promptly at 10 for the class, only to discover that it was
actually "Spanish" time and the class didn't start until 10:45. This
gave us the opportunity to enjoy mojitos on the Ramblas. The teacher of
the salsa class is quite a character. He's from Paraguay and is always
wearing cowboy boots, tight white pants, silk shirts with several of
the top buttons undone and swinging around his long black hair while
he's shaking his hips. The other night we were sitting outside of
another bar nearby when we saw him walking by with a tamborine. He said
he was walking around making music for himself but agreed to play a
little bit for us. So fun! I'm really going to miss going to salsa
every Monday...especially because I just got to be friends with one of
the guys who goes there! His name is Alejandro and he's from Uruguay.
This past Monday we practiced salsa with eachother and when we parted
ways he said "maybe I'll see you around." I thought this was such a
great line, it reminds me of the movie "P.S. I Love You" where the two
main characters run into eachother on the road and totally hit it off
and then say if it's meant to be they'll run into eachother again.
Little did I know that Alejandro works at Havana and I have seen him
every single night this week, plus Alicante is a such a small place
that you're bound to run into people even if you try to avoid them...
(more about that later...)
La
playa. Only 10 minutes from my house, but I only spent the afternoon
there about once a week. I'd much prefer to spend the afternoon having
a siesta in my bed, at a cafe with my friends or walking around the
city. Of course, when I go to Madrid and there is no beach I will
probably kick myself for not going more. At least I wont wish I'd spent
more time getting tan since even if I spent every minute at the beach I
would still be white! My host dad told me one night that I needed to go
to the beach more. I am pretty sure I also heard him use the word
"mortician" and then he made an imitation of a zombie with their hands
stretched out in front of them. I'm pretty sure he was suggesting that
I am so white I look dead, but since it was in slurred rapid Spanish I
will never know for sure.
A
Saturday at the top of the castle in Alicante with Johannes, Nor and
Jasmin (taking the photo). My first week in Alicante Jasmin, Mark and I
attempted to climb up to the castle without success. Thankfully (or
maybe not...) we had Nor as our guide this time and after some initial
thoughts that he was leading us in the wrong direction, we finally did
arrive at the road leading up to the castle. As Nor told me, ¨Todos los
caminos llevan a Roma,¨and after he repeated it several times I finally
understood that he meant All Roads Lead to Rome. It was an interesting
afternoon to say the least. The sun was shining, the view of Alicante
and the vast expanse of the Mediterranean was amazing and Jasmin and
Johannes were great company. Although it was very gracious of Nor to
offer to be our guide, I can´t say I was thrilled about it. He only
speaks Spanish (and Arabic) and after a late night of dancing the night
before my brain wasn´t up for endless conversing in Spanish. Not to
mention that he was enamored with me and since I don´t know how to say
¨Let´s just be friends¨in Spanish, I was left with the conundrum of how
to make it apparent that I wasn´t interested when I couldn´t use the
easy cop out of having a boyfriend because I´d already told him the
truth. In the end I decided to remain silent for most of the afternoon,
which I later found out he really liked! For the next week we would run
into Nor every single day. Granted, Alicante is a small town, but some
of the circumstances seemed a bit too coincidental. It probably didn´t
help that our favorite cafe was directly below his apartment...Anyways,
by my last night there I think he had finally gotten the hint and I was
able to return to some of my favorite dancing establishments without
worrying if he´d be there or not.
Unfortunately at the
moment I don´t have many more photos from Alicante accesible for this
blog. There were many times in Alicante that I wondered why I had even
chose to come to this relatively small coastal town when I knew my
heart was in Madrid, such as when my roommate ¨borrowed¨my cell phone
for the night without asking or when my host family locked their
kitchen cupboard leaving me with only crackers for breakfast. However,
the good memories by far outweigh these darker spots and thanks to my
optimistic attitude I think I will forever remember Alicante with
fondness. Although my roommate wasn´t everything I could of wished for,
I somehow found myself on the same path as an amazing girl from
Switzerland, Jasmin, who had also decided that taking a break from her
job to learn Spanish in Alicante from March 23rd to April 19th, 2008,
was just what she needed. We had the privelege of spending nearly every
day together and through a mix of English and Spanish enjoyed many
conversations about
relationships,
priorities and worldviews while she drank her token black tea with milk
and me, always a cafe con leche. As I sit here in my new school in
Madrid finishing this blog, I can´t help but remember the esplanada of
Alicante and the crumbling steps of the barrio antigua where every
night you´d find crowds of people from all over the world and of
varying ages congregating for cheap beer and converstions in a mixla of
languages. I´m not sure if Alicante is a city I will ever return to
again, as many of my memories involve the incredible people I enjoyed
my time with. However, my experiences of that city have melted into my
heart and are now inseperable from who I am, wherever in the world I
may be. And now...it is time to embrace Madrid!!!
