Espana Part I

1/31/09
18:51

I am back in my cabin aboard the MV Explorer after my whirlwind trip in Spain.  For the past four days I have lived the life of a Spaniard, but I think if I were to try and continue that lifestyle I would either be permanently sleep-deprived and chronically irritable or deathly ill…or both.  So here is the tale of my Spanish adventures.

CADIZ (Dizzy):
My time in Cadiz began wonderfully.  A group of girls including myself had decided to go on a run in port, so once everyone was cleared to leave the ship we started what will probably be one of the best runs of my life.  I was giddy.  It was so nice to be on land, to be in Spain, just to be.  I had a smile plastered on my face the entire time.  It was a great way to see the city, which is rather small.  As we ran through narrow cobblestone alleys bordered by beautiful buildings and along the Spanish coast, I tried to process the very idea that I was in Spain. SPAIN!

We returned to the ship and prepared for a day in Cadiz.  Caroline, Jill, Alicia and I began our day by grabbing a bite to eat at a restaurant called Caja Rural Del Sur. Don’t know what that means, but I’ll look it up later.  At this restaurant I found out that I had wrongfully assumed that many people would speak English in Spain.  After seating ourselves, we were given about 4 different menus to order from (a regularity in Spain) all in  Spanish and there was still other food options that were not included on the menu.  Jill and I decided to split a quesadilla con queso and we planned to ask for pollo as well (why not?).  Upon doing so in stilted Spanish, the waiter laughed in our faces and said, “No pollo” but it seemed more like “Stupid Americans”.  This was my first taste of Spanish waiters.  People in the service industry in Europe do not cater to you as they do in the U.S.

I did, however, meet one man that despite the extreme language barrier was quite helpful and he is my favorite person in Cadiz.  As I have mentioned I was on a mission to find art supplies while in Spain and after exploring the city for about four hours on foot, we chanced upon this tiny art shop in a back alley.  I was ecstatic.  I whipped out the supply list and started picking out paints and brushes.  A lot of the supplies I needed were behind the counter or in the back so I needed to ask for them.  Easy, right? No.  My Spanish vocab failed me as I have only taken one semester and we did not really go over “kneaded eraser” and “watercolor paper.”  Also, for some reason, the only foreign language I could conjure in my head was French.  But the man that owned the store patiently grabbed materials as I gestured and pointed and pieced together phrases like “papele por lapis” or “lapis numero quatro”.  Once I had all my supplies he even threw in a free vase for holding my brushes.  I love him.

The first day in Cadiz was exhausting.  After running 3 miles in the morning, we walked through and through the city for about seven hours surviving only off an early lunch, banana split-flavored ice cream and chocolate con churros (perfection).  After our treats and using the free WiFi in the town square we had a late dinner at about 11:30pm that only cost 3 Euros.  We proceeded to explore the bar scene after this.  We were too early for the partiers in Spain, however, so every place was just filled with people from the ship.  Cadiz had literally been taken over by SAS people and pretty much every where I went people were asking, “Semester at Sea?”, “Americanos?” “SASers?”  Except all those that were questioning were students, and we see each other every day, so it was kind of pointing out the obvious.  I finally headed back to the ship at about 1:30am (an early night in Spain) and went to sleep because I had to get up early for my 7:20am train to Madrid.