First things first: I am famous. I show up for a good 2.5 seconds in the background of Pesadilla en la Cocina... check out the moments between 2:08 and 2:20 in the third section and you can see my marvelous profile. The rest you can ignore, its not important.
http://www.lasexta.com/videos/pesadilla-en-la-cocina/2013-enero-27-2013012500028.html
This weekend I went on a grand adventure to Alhama de Granada. Before you think it, no I am not forgetting the 'bra', Alhama is different from the Alhambra, the famous castle in Granada capital. Alama is a white washed town tucked into the mountains between Malaga and Grenada. On the way in you can see the Sierra Nevada to the Northeast, and the hills are covered with grapevines, olive trees and almond trees, which are just starting to flower.
This second picture isn't that stellar but you can see the sun setting on the hills outside of the town which was beautiful
The town, like most here in on the old continent, is very old. They have found 'prehistoric remains' there and the Romans were definitely there, as proved by some crumbling arches, bridges and aqueduct systems. The Romans were followed by the Moors, which is where its name today comes from: al hammam in arabic are arabic baths and in Alhama there are thermal pools.
The river is cold water and the pools to the right have varying temperatures. Apparently during the day it is mostly tourists that use them, or old people treating rheumatism etc. The people of Alhama go at night, bringing candles and a date. Very stinky (sulphur...) but lots of romance points for sure!
There were two reasons for our trek to Alhama, the first being that it is my friend Paqui's hometown and we went and stayed at her parents' house. That meant realllllly good food and top treatment from Spanish mom. We had a full spread for breakfast, and lunch the next day was homemade sausages, chicken soup, salad with olives they picked and wine that they made. I forgot to mention that they make their own wine-her brother and her dad have a bodega in the basement of their house. We ended up buying 10 bottles of wine from them, which meant heading down to the basement (three of the four of us couldn't enter the bodega because we were on our period and if we entered, superstition says the wine goes bad)to fill up the bottles with a siphon. That was followed with corking the bottles and I got to put their sticker labels on!
The second reason we went to Alhama was the First Annual Wine Festival! As there are many local bodegas like the one Paqui's family runs, they started a festival. The thirsty visitors (ie me) pay 3 euros and they get a hand made painted ceramic cup that you can then fill up as many times as you want to...needless to say that within a few hours there were more than a handful of veeeerrry cheerful people in the square. They also had paella, sausage and cheese plates for sale. I spent the afternoon drinking and eating and meeting approximately a bajillion people.
I should also add that at the same time they were celebrating the Candelaria-a celebration where they light campfires on the side of the street. I didn't really get a good reason for why they celebrate it-wikipedia is giving me a variety of reasons-the arrival of the black madonna, the pagan celebration of the middle of the winter, the 40th day after Jesus was born and the purification ritual that goes with it...so one of those. It was nice smelling campfire smoke all day though, and walking past all the fires and warming my hands. It was cold up in the mountains! Upper 30s! Brrr. Also they always put up swings! Big swings! Swings that go between the balconies on either side of the street. Swings between two telephone pole like posts in the central plaza. Obviously I went on the swing multiple times. Weeee!!
Look at the pretty pictures!
The weekend was also for all intents and purposes an intensive language boot camp. I spoke only Spanish from Friday night when we left to Sunday night when we returned, with no internet access. Needless to say my brain was melting out my ears. I am sure my Spanish improved-as my Dad said to me, I am putting in my 10,000 hours to get to mastery-but I am not satisfied, which I am sure is a good thing and the reason my Spanish has come as far as it has. Oh well, step by step!
Being cut off from internet and my 'home' here in Linea served to make me feel quite homesick. Especially because the weekend was about going back to Paqui's home, meeting her old friends and her parents and being involved in the town's traditions. Absolutely a wonderful experience and I feel very lucky to have been taken along on the trip, but I couldn't help but think of my own lovely home and family and girlfriend and traditions and food and rhythms and language...I am so grateful for my experiences here, and I am soaking up every minute of it. But my, my city's filthy. PNW I'll be back soon.
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