The Part where Spaniards like to Hack Apart Farm Animals.

¡Hola guapos! September 26 marks one month that I've been in Spain, and what a month it's been. I've finally started to do some in-Spain travel and am in the process of planning trips to Manchester, Berlin and Basel. After India, it was nice to be a little more settled and take advantage of all Madrid has to offer, but I'm ready to grab my backpack and head into the abyss again. One of the things I think is really important to share with all of you after a month here is something you will not find in a Spanish guidebook. Oh no, no, while Lonely Planet and Rick Steves are great resources, they won't tell you something that I figured out in a weekend here: that Spaniards really love to mutilate the shit out of farm animals.

One of the places I've visited so far is Segovia. It was just a USAC day trip, where we toured a castle and saw really old Roman aqueducts, while a teeny tiny Spanish tour guide over-enunciated every word she said to us through her microphone. I'm not really one for guided tours and large group activities, but the trip was already paid for and Segovia was quaint and lovely, so I decided to go along. Little did I know what would await me when lunch rolled around. Segovia is famous for its roast suckling pig, or cochinillo. Spain is incredibly diverse in its regions, and each region has a dish that is its specialty. In Madrid it's calamari sandwiches (even though it's at least four hours from here to the closest ocean), in Valencia it's paella, and in Segovia it's roast suckling pig. If you've never seen a roast suckling pig, it looks something like this:

When it comes out to your table its little baby piggy body smells of oil and herbs, and it looks at you with a half-grimace, half-smile like it kind of enjoyed the roasting it just endured (little masochist). It's little baby hooves and little baby tail are toasty and crisp even though the rest of its body is flattened out like roadkill. For me, this was the best part of the day. I totally love weird food and trying new food, so when the waiter set the pig on a tray next to me before cutting it up, I could hardly contain my excitement. What I didn't know, though, is that part of the cochinillo tradition is that you don't carve it with a knife like a turkey. Instead, you take a plate, turn it sideways and start whacking that little baby pig as hard as you can.

Chunks of meat fly like bits of shrapnel as the pig starts looking less like Babe and more like lunch. Finally, when the pig is thoroughly hacked apart, the cutting plate is thrown on the ground and breaks into a billion pieces. Then lunch can be served. If you're me, you're really excited that you get to stare at this while you eat:

Other people in the group were not so stoked on their lunch smiling at them. Eh, to each his own. However, this was not the only farm animal I would watch be hacked apart over the weekend. Oh no, no. On the contrary, there was a day filled with much more blood and gore as I also had the pleasure (if that's what you want to call it) of going to a bull fight.

(Here's us being toro-like before the fight. Intimidating, no?)

I'll tell you flat out that I know absolutely nothing about bulls or bull fights. I went because it's part of the culture and a good excuse to do some day drinking. I know it's super controversial and gory and a lot of people are not into it at all, but for me, it's all part of the experience. A Spanish friend and I got onto the topic of bullfights the other day, and he had a really interesting point to make about all of it. In the United States most of the meat we eat is raised in super small cages where it's packed full of hormones and antibiotics for the duration of its pathetic life before eat it. Who's to say if that's better or worse than a bullfight? It certainly happens in much larger quantities than bull fights do. However, in typical American fashion, it all happens behind closed doors. Bull fights, in all of their Spanish essence, happen right in your face. As your stuffing pistachios and beer into your mouth, you're looking at this:

The end of September is not bullfighting season in Madrid. Because of this, tickets were super cheap and the fights were mostly amateur. We got front row seats for 10 euros, which was awesome, but what was even better was that we were lucky enough to sit in front of an old Spanish woman and her husband who have been going to bull fights for twenty years!! WHOA!! They were serious fans and explained the art to us in thorough detail. Both of them were not at all impressed with the fights that night and the amount of suffering the bulls had to endure. It was really sad to watch the decline of the bulls. By the time they're close to death, a constant stream of blood is pouring out of their wildly pumping arteries and their tongues hang out in a pathetic, surrendered manner. When the matador finally does kill the bull, it collapses like a great soldier stricken down in battle, a ton of muscle and force falling to the ground, accepting defeat. Then a horse-drawn cart drags it out of the ring, leaving a pathway of blood behind it as the matador in his very masculine pink socks receives praise from the crowds.

So there you have it. Spaniards hack apart farm animals, people pay to watch it and (human) life goes on. Así es la vida.

The Part where I don´t actually go to School in Spain.

Happy first (or more likely second) week of school everybody! How´s it been going? I hope you´ve all learned a lot and that your textbooks didn´t cost a fortune. I´m sending good thoughts your way that your lab partner won´t be that girl who only ever talks about her sorority and your professors will be radical and inspiring. As for me, I´m still just hanging out in Madrid, because for the past two days my classes have been canceled. The professor for all of the advanced Spanish classes (all of my classes) is having some sort of emergency that they won´t tell us about and has been unable to attend class. For tomorrow and Thursday there is a substitute for the grammar class, but my literature and stylistics classes are canceled for the whole week. Happy extra week of summer vacation to me? While it´s kind of awesome that I still get to just hang out, estoy aquí para aprender, ¿no?

Anyways, I figured you may be wondering what one does in a big, beautiful city like Madrid when all responsibilities seem to vanish into thin air. Luckily for me, there are a million things you can learn just by being in la calle, and honestly, I don´t mean to toot my own horn, but I totally kick ass at being Spanish! Seriously, people keep asking me for directions and stuff! Then they hear me talk and it´s suddenly obvious that I´m not from here.. anyways, here´s a list of 10 things you can do to make yourself super Spanish without ever going to school:

1. Strut your stuff with confidence. Spanish women are beautiful and effortlessly stylish. They´re the kind of women who can make high heels seem casual for walking your dog on a Tuesday afternoon, and I kind of love it. While my possessions currently total four shirts, a skirt, a sweater and a pair of jeans (the minimalistic lifestyle is a long story for another day), you better believe I´ve been trying to keep up with these sassy, Spanish ladies.

2. Stare. Seriously. Spanish people unabashidly stare more than anyone I´ve ever seen. They´ll stare at you for a 40 minute metro ride, and when you make eye-contact with them, they won´t smile. They´ll just keep on staring. Don´t smile at them either. While this is totally weird and creepy at first, it´s actually kind of fun because it means you can stare at other people without being rude. Watching people is a great way to learn the culture and the languge.

3. If you´re a boy yell "guapa, guapa, guapa" like a chicken at every girl who passes you on the street, even if she´s not that cute. If you´re girl, keep up the strut you had going earlier and ignore this.

4. When in doubt of what to say, always go with vale. Vale is like "okay" and can be used for pretty much anything that has a positive answer. You will hear people say it a million times a day and you should say it too... ¿vale?

5. Eat tapas. People in Spain don´t eat giant meals like we do in the US. Breakfast is usually a small but delicious café con leche and perhaps a pastry or toast with tomatoes and olive oil, while dinner is an array of tapas, or appetizers, that you pair with wine or beer and share with people. Lunch is the biggest meal of the day, but Spaniards also take nap after eating it. You should take a nap too because you´ll inevitably...

6. Stay up late. In Madrid it´s not uncommon to see kids playing in the street until 11 pm. If you´re going to go out with friends, you´ll meet up around 11 for dinner, go to the bars until 1 or 2, then to the clubs that open at 2 am, where you´ll find yourself dancing until 6 am when the metro starts up again. Believe me, you´ll love your little siesta in the middle of the day.

7. This one is silly and shouldn´t even have to be mentioned, but I am going to say it anyways: speak Spanish. Even if all you know is vale, that´s better than nothing and people will appreciate it. The Americans are really easy to pick out here because we are so loud and jabbering away in a foreign language. Madrileños aren´t huge fans of foreigners anyway, but if you try to make them cater to your culture instead of the other way around, they can be especially unpleasant.

8. Leave you flip-flops and university sweatshirt at home. Remember the woman walking her dog in high heels? She´s offended by your flip-flops. Now, believe me, I love a good pair of flip-flops and a hoodie as much as the next person, but at the right place and time. Europeans don´t wear flip-flops in public, nor do they wear Stanford sweatshirts. I wouldn´t have worn tank-tops or short skirts in India because Indians don´t wear that. Same idea.

9. Botellón (drinking in public). Spaniards love to drink in the streets/metro/plazas/parks. Join them! Most people get pretty chatty after passing around a bottle of vino, and you´ll love the stories you hear from them. If you run out of booze, you can buy it from a Chino with backpack. 6 cañas for €5. Don´t get wasted, though. While Spaniards obviously like to have a good time, they really don´t like public drunkenness and will find belligerent study abroad students obnoxious and rude.

10. For number 10: to everyone I know who´s been to/lived in Spain, I´d love to hear your tidbit about what makes you a rocking Spaniard. Can you roll the world´s best cigarette? Does joder put up a fair fight with vale for the most commonly used word in the Spanish language? Must you always look exhausted and annoyed on the metro to be a true Spaniard? Do you sport your Real Madrid jersey with pride?

Hopefully, one of these days I will start classes like I came here to do. Until then, I´ll keep learning in la calle and updating you on my love affair with this fantastic place. Dos besos.

The Next Part

A year ago I started planning for this adventure, and since then I´ve been telling people that I´m going to go to India and then I´m going to go to Spain. Welp, the India part is completed and now I find myself sitting in a locutería (that´s an internet cafe if you ever are in Spain) down the street from my teeny tiny apartment. How bizarre that this is actually working, and going well on top of that. It´s surreal, really.

I left India on Friday morning, flew 10 hours to London then another 2 to Madrid, arriving around 12:00 am. I navigated the metro all by myself (I´m so grown-up!), and found my CouchSurfer´s apartment. If ya´ll haven´t heard of CouchSurfing, check it out! It´s a super awesome organization of people that provides you with an instant network of friends wherever you go. Seriously, in the past three days they have given me a roof over my head, food to eat, beer to drink, jokes to laugh at, taken me to the flea market, and tonight we´re going on a picnic. The ones that I have been hanging out with all live in an apartment together and met over Couchsurfing, so it´s a very international household. German, English, Spanish and Portuguese have abounded in our conversations, and I am so, so thankful to Trini, Ben, Leo and Pablo for making me feel at home in this big, strange city.

However, I have also learned a few things in the past three days that encourages me to tell all of you to take the plundge and put yourself, by yourself, in a totally foreign situation. It´s not at hard as you think!! Granted, I do speak the language here, and it would be much harder to be here if I couldn´t communicate with the locals, but whatever. Go to England, or Australia, or New Zealand! What the hell, go to India! They speak English (kind of). Just go somewhere new, put yourself in awkward, foreign situations. Get lost. Curse the world when you can´t figure out how your apartment keys work. Love the old man sitting next to you in the restaurant who is feeding pastries to his tiny dog under the table. Grip your purse like a paranoid maniac because everyone keeps telling you that you'll get pick-pocketed. Laugh at the awkward moments between teenage boys and girls on the metro. Wander the streets until you get to know your neighborhood. And talk to everyone. I mean everyone. That includes the grumpy lady sitting next to you in the post office, the Cuban waitress who makes your cafe con leche, the drag queen walking down the street on her way home when you emerge from your building in the morning (have I mentioned I live in the gay neighborhood?), the overly polite and formal store clerk who is helping you buy sheets in sizes you don´t understand. You´ll be amazed at the stories people will share with you, the warmth they will exude, the insight they will give you into the culture.

Now, I´m not saying this is all fun and exciting. I´ve cried more over the past few days than I have in a while, because right now I am totally and completely alone, and it´s often frustrating. True, I have met some incredibly helpful and kind people through CouchSurfing, but they have their own lives and can´t hold my hand everyday. And while Spain is a cakewalk compared to India, it is still a foreign country and things don´t make sense (what do you mean everything closes for four hours in the afternoon so everyone can have a siesta!?), but through all of this, I will become a stronger and more well-rounded person. I´m proving to myself that I´m capable of things that at other points in my life would have seemed impossible. And outside of that, my study abroad program starts on Wednesday, so I´ll meet other people who are going through the same wild adjustment as me, and we will all come to realize together our boundless capabilities.

Wish me luck, my loved ones. It´s only day 3 and I´ve got many more ahead, but I feel that this next part is going to be an amazing and life-changing adventure.