i'm baaaaaack!

Hey strangers, it's been awhile!

I apologize for the huge gap in posts, the last few weeks have been busy and I also have a sneaking suspicion that someone out there hit the big cosmic fast-forward button, time has been flying! Tomorrow will mark week 8 of this 15 week program, over halfway! Cripes.

The last three weeks were a little more tranquilo (calm) than the previous few weeks, I spent nearly all of the time here in Salamanca, going to classes, enjoying some cultural events, having intercambios, continuing my quest for a church (which was successful!), etc. I went to go see the play Todos eran mis hijos (All my sons - Alfred Miller) one day with some other IES kids which was an experience, it is such a heavy story, if you haven't already I would definitely recommend seeing it if you ever get the chance. During some downtime I went exploring in Salamanca and also took a tour of la Catedral Nueva which was cool.

 some fun graffiti in the street. 

 they have such cool drain spouts here!

 more fun graffiti, the bubble next to its head says 'smile.'

 your guess is as good as mine. 

 the tower of la Catedral Nueva.

 the view of the city of Salamanca from the top of the tower.

this picture shows both of the cupolas of the cathedrals, la Nueva in the upper right and la Vieja in the center left.

In addition to exploring Salamanca a bit more, I also went with Allison two weekends ago (the 15th) to Alba de Tormes, a small town (pueblo) about half an hour from Salamanca by bus, to explore and see la Fiesta de Santa Teresa. While there we saw the castle that at one time was the seat of power for the Duke of Alba, the San Juan de la Cruz museum, the museum and basilica dedicated to Santa Teresa (not to be confused with Mother Teresa), la playa (beach!), and sort of accidentally became part of a parade (desfile) for children. 

 beaches! little bit sketch..

 La Basilica de Santa Teresa - it was never completed, that's why it looks sort of half-done.

 La Torre de Homenaje - what is left of the castle.

 The view of the surrounding country from the top of the tower.

 That right there, is the pointer finger of San Juan de la Cruz (b. 1542)- you may know him as Saint John of the Cross.

 This is the beach! haha.

 And this lovely specimen is the heart of Santa Teresa de Ávila (b. 1515)

And this is her arm. Apparently Franco kept the other one next to him while he slept because he thought it would protect him from death. 

 I couldn't get a very good picture but this is the parade we encountered. There were guys dressed up with giant masks on (they call them cabezudos which basically means 'big heads') who threw candy and hit the children (relatively lightly) with sticks during the parade.

The shrine of Santa Teresa. 

As I mentioned earlier, my quest for a church/christian community has finally been successful! Two weeks ago Allison and I went together to a new church and it was so welcoming!! We met a whole bunch of Spaniards as well as other foreign exchange students from the US, Germany, and South America. One of the girls from the US told us about the group she's here working with which happens to be a Christian fellowship group for students called En Vivo. They have various events throughout the week but so far I've been going to the ones on Tuesdays and Thursdays, one is a youth group type of meeting with music and worship and the other is a time to hang out and speak English haha. Anybody that wants to come and speak English is welcome and we basically chill and drink hot chocolate/coffee and help people become more familiar with the language. So that has been exciting! 

The other big news of the last couple weeks is that my hard drive crashed! :(  So I was about a week without a computer which was really stressful because it's kind of my lifeline here, my connection to friends and family back home, my planner, my means of doing homework... I took it to a computer shop near my house and everything is all straightened out now, but wow, was that an experience! Maybe a topic for another blog post, we'll see. Anyway, I think that's all I've got for now! 

Hope you all have a great Wednesday! ¡Abrazos!

A parting picture, la Plaza Mayor en rojo? Not sure why but it's cool!

catholics, caballos, and coffins

Well hello everyone, welcome back!

It's been a little while and there is so much to tell! I'll start with last weekend, more or less where I left off in the last post.

So last Friday and Saturday weren't very eventful, mostly I just went to classes, chilled out, and did homework. Saturday was the first day in a while that I could relax a little, take a deep breath, and just enjoy a chill routine day here in Salamanca, so that was really nice. Sunday was an all around good day, I got to sleep in a little bit and then a handful of us IES students went to mass in La Catedral Nueva which was cool, we got to hear the priests and deacons singing in Latin before the mass started, but it's still missing something. From my personal experiences and what we've talked about in my Comparative Religion class thus far, practicing Catholicism in Spain seems to be very different from the practice in the US. When we go to mass here in Spain there are no books (I can't remember the official term for them) to read along with the priest or lectors, there is no singing (besides the Gloria and Hallelujah), and we were the only people there under the age of 60.  The mass feels very mechanical, as if everyone checks out and goes on autopilot the minute they hit the pews (los bancos); it's a far cry from the celebration that I've always been taught the mass should be.

I'm starting to get a taste of the relationship the Spaniards have with the Church, and it's very different than I expected. If Spain and the Catholic Church were in a relationship on facebook, the status would most certainly be "it's complicated," and within reason! Do a little bit of research into the Spanish Civil War (or the reign of Los Reyes Católicos) and it's easy to see why there are some issues going on here. Maybe I'll dedicate a post to this later on, but for right now this is heavy stuff so let's move onto something a little more fun...

Horseback riding! On Sunday afternoon we drove about 30 minutes to a farm (finca) outside of Salamanca where they raise horses (caballos), bulls (toros), pigs (cerdos), and oh yeah, toreros (matadors/bullfighters!). The farm is called Picadero Valverde if you want to check out their website. We spent about an hour and a half riding through the farm which reminded me a lot of the American Southwest. Check it out:

It was really hot and there were a lot of flies but the landscape was austerely beautiful and we got to see lots of animals, including an adorable dog taking a bath in what I think was supposed to be a drinking trough for the cows (las vacas). Mostly all of the trees we saw were a type of oak native to Spain that are pretty important because they produce acorns (bellotas) which are the main food source for los toros. It was so relaxing to just chill out on a horse for a couple of hours, but too soon it was over and we headed back to Salamanca smelling like a farm and some of us feeling like we had just done some serious butt and thigh workouts.

Monday started an important week - our first week of classes at the University of Salamanca! This week was a little frustrating as many of us had to make repeated class changes after discovering that a) the class schedule had been changed, unbeknownst to us and/or b) the professor was unwilling or unable to change the final exam date to accommodate our need to you know, fly back to the states at some point before January. However, after much ado, most people figured out their schedules and once again all is right with the world. I had some issues with one of the classes I wanted to take, but (thank God) the class that I most wanted to take, la Historia de las Relaciones de Genero (History of Gender Relations), works in my schedule and the professor is awesome! I was really nervous at first because I knew I was the only americana in the class, but the professor made me feel really welcome and she even said she was excited that I am taking the class because we are going to talk about the differences/similarities between women's movements in the US and women's movements in Latin America and Spain (EXCITEMENT!). I am really excited about this class, I can't wait for this week!

This week was also eventful for my IES classes, we're really starting to get into the subject of the classes, rather than just introductory material, and we even took a field trip in my Comparative Religion class. Guess where?

Cementerio Municipal San Carlos Borromeo

The cemetery (el cementerio)! I could probably go on for ages about this because I thought it was so cool; my professor took us on a tour of the cemetery and gave us the low-down on some funerary customs, burial practices, etc. In Salamanca there are two cemeteries, the municipal one that we visited and a smaller cemetery that was started about eight years ago to handle overflow and a growing population of non-Catholic residents (the municipal cemetery if officially designated a Catholic cemetery - someone asked the prof if there were more and he basically said it was more or less unnecessary to have another because at the time when this cemetery was built everyone was Catholic, at least by tradition if not by religious preference). If you want to be buried here you have to purchase a plot (tumba), a mausoleum (panteon), or a space in the wall (nicho).  Here are some examples of all three:

 nichos - these usually fit two bodies, but we saw some that had as many as eight! 

 your average tumba - these are made for a single person but can fit just about as many as a family wants

and the panteon - the Lexus of the afterlife

Anyway, so you pay for a tomb and everything is cool right? Well, maybe. If you start paying for your spot but after five years you still haven't finished they dig you up and move you to what our prof described as just a big hole in the ground with a bunch of bones, no grave marker, no pretty flowers, nada.

The whole waiting period of five years is pretty important, it is the length of time that a body must be left undisturbed in the tomb before it can be moved or other bodies can be added. So, potentially after you've been snuggled in your tomb for five years, all comfy and used to the space, if you have a family member who dies it's likely that they'll gather up all of your pieces, stuff you in a bag or a small box, and the next thing you know you're sharing your 2x6 space with (at least) one other body for the rest of eternity. Check out these guys, packed in like sardines I'm sure: 

All of those people are in that one single tumba.

We also got to see some tombs of some gitanos (gypsies) which usually have tons of flowers, lots of decorative stuff on them, and a bench to sit at. Los gitanos still practice el luto, a mourning ritual in which, after the death of a person, all of the women in the family dress in black from head to toe for a minimum of one year. They also visit the tomb of the person who has died and sit there to be with the person (hence the benches near the tombs). There are other customs that go along with luto as well, no attending parties or getting married or anything like that. Additionally the gitanos believe that the house (tomb) after death should be just as or more comfortable as the house you lived in while you were alive so they decorate the tombs elaborately, here are some examples:

Also in the cemetery there are a lot of cats, cats everywhere! Our professor told us it's because the widows and widowers (viudas/viudos) come to spend time at the tomb of their spouse and they often bring food to feed the cats so they just keep multiplying haha. Anyway, I don't want to bore you anymore with stories about the cemetery, but I thought it was really cool.

The rest of last week was mostly uneventful except for the welcome fair at the university (very much like the activities fair we have at Gettysburg) and that was useful because I got some good information about some clubs and stuff. However, Friday morning we left bright and early to spend the weekend in Andalucia, in Sevilla and Granada! That is for my next post however, ¡hasta pronto chicos!

:)