Things I Will Desperately Miss

And thus, of course, here’s the follow-up list:

1. Patra’s knee-slapping jokes (I think there were 3 or 4 this year, and they were all gems)
2. Taking flamenco lessons in a bar, ie, doing as much drinking as dancing
3. Our terrace. Our terrace on perfect days, meals on the terrace, hanging laundry on the terrace, drinking sherry on the terrace at sunset
4. 300 children
5. Seeing one of my 300 children on the street and feeling like a star
6. Saying hello to all the old men taking their morning, afternoon, and evenings walks
7. Living in a cubist’s dream
8. Being halfway between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean
9. Taking Sevilla for granted since it’s just an hour away
10. Hearing Spanish every day, especially the awesome accent the old men have here
11. Being constantly inspired by the beauty of this town
12. Cheap tickets to everywhere else in Europe
13. Being serenaded by an incredible flamenco guitarist
14. Doing yoga in an old Spanish patio
15. The Friday market
16. Olive oil, organic eggs, fruit in season all year round
17. The cliff
18. Flamenco parties every Friday and Saturday (and spontaneous flamenco in the street)
19. The fact that everyone knows how to clap in rhythm here

This list is actually harder than the last, because many of the things I will miss aren’t as concrete as the things I won’t miss. That is, I will miss all the smells of this town, all the strange and beautiful things I see every day, I will miss the sounds in the streets of the old men talking, of bands practicing for Semana Santa, I will miss the feeling that everyone welcomes me in. And I will miss hundreds of people—Patra and Adan, Emma and all the Brits, Santi and the women we danced flamenco with, my co-teachers, the choir members, the shop keepers and café owners, all the townspeople I’ve become accustomed to seeing…and, as I said above, the hundreds and hundreds of children who I love more than I thought possible. But the year has come to an end and I don’t belong here anymore. Such is life. On to the next adventure.

Turning 23, I think I'm turning 23

23 has been my lucky number since I was five years old when it was the number on the mat assigned to me for nap time. We've been close ever since. Perhaps it's most significant appearance in my life occurred in a place ripe for superstitions and lucky numbers: a casino in Montreal. It was my first--and thus far last--trip to a casino and, big spender that I am, I placed aside $20 with which to gamble. I converted my precious cash into four 5-dollar chips (I would have done twenty 1-dollar chips if they'd let me) and headed to roulette. First chip on black and the number turned up red. Second chip on odds, the number came up even. Third chip on some random area of the board, and lost that one, too. With my last chip clutched in my hand, I eyed 23. Why not? I would most definitely lose, but all more "surer" bets had lost. But I lost heart. I selected another random area of the board, one that didn't include 23. And the number that came up? 23, of course. I took that as a direct sign that I was not meant for the gambling life, and haven't done so since. Who knows what kind of a person 23 saved me from becoming?

In any case, my affinity for 23 has long made me believe good things would happen when I finally reached the age. Many months ago I became nervous when I realized it would occur during my year in Spain. I wondered if anyone would know it was my birthday, if there would be any special celebration at all, if I would be surrounded by friends like I was last year at the end of my time at Dartmouth. Turns out I had nothing to fear.

The day itself was a study in Reasons I Love My Life in Arcos: I was with my kids in the morning, some of whom had bought presents for me (a silver coin purse, silver sandals that were somehow exactly the right size, and the first item of clothing with Minnie Mouse on it that I've owned since I was 5). There was also cake and a belly-dance performance by my 10-year olds which was just a little awkward. In the afternoon I went to yoga (Patra, to our yoga teacher: "Jenna's having a special day!" Yoga teacher, looking aghast, "You didn't get married, did you?" Me: "No, I just turned 23." Yoga teacher: "Thank God. Your mother would have killed me.") Patra and I had dinner on the terrace and went to flamenco in the evening (the class sang "Cumpleanos Feliz" and one of my fellow dancers with delightfully bowed legs chided me for not bringing a cake). All in all, it was not so different from any other Wednesday in Arcos, which is to say it was perfect. The kind of day that makes me think 23 is indeed my lucky number.

I love Arcos in the springtime

In Arcos, as in most of southern Spain, there are 5 seasons: Fall from Oct-Nov; Winter from Dec-Jan; Spring from Feb-April; Summer in May, June, and Sept; and Unbearable Heat in July and August. I am lucky in that I will experience all these seasons except UH, which I designate as such only from stories of heat waves at 4 in the morning upwards of 120 degrees Fahrenheit. I am also lucky in that, being February, Patra and I have decided that spring has officially arrived.

Spring is unmistakable, though the name of the month we're in catches me by surprise (I think now of the snow storm that canceled classes at Dartmouth on Valentine's just two years ago; my Valentine's this year will be considerably warmer). The air is calm, birds and bugs have returned, laundry dries within a few hours. Laundry is, now, my way of classifying the weather: calculating variables such as cloud cover, length of daylight, strength of the sun's heat, wind force (can't be too windy; two weeks ago the wind was so strong it blew down the line I'd just hung my clothes on), moisture content in the air, likeliness of rain. Over the past few months--the winter months--laundry was an infrequent possibility. Now I sit on my terrace for hours, storks passing by overhead, bright banners of laundry drying on terraces below...yes, spring has definitely arrived.

But at least I saw Africa...

The theme of my last blog has come true much too often in the past week. Immediately after I wrote the blog I went to flamenco class, expecting to, well, dance. Instead, we discussed the nature of male-female relations in Spain in the present day and what to do if we know someone who's being abused in their relationship (at first I was disappointed not to dance, but then I realized that this conversation was invaluable cultural insight). Then this week, flamenco class was replaced with drinks at a nearby bar. Also a form of cultural insight? Continuing on that flamenco-not-working-out theme, Patra and I went to Sevilla yesterday to see a show featuring Antonio "El Pipa," the teacher of the class we went to in Jerez (see "Rain, Dance"). And it was sold out. But in each of these cases there was a valuable replacement for the activity I expected to do--serious conversation and then drinks with my dirty-joke-telling flamenco classmates (all women over the age of 50), Sevilla nightlife and fabulous tapas.

I'm still looking for a lesson in my travels (travails) of today. I boarded a bus at 4:30 in Sevilla that was supposed to go through Jerez, from which I would take a bus back to Arcos. At about 6:00, I began to realize that Jerez was not in my bus driver's agenda. We went past the city, to be sure, but failed to stop anywhere nearby. The saddest part of the ride, besides the immediate knot that tied up my innards as I came to this realization, was when we passed a turnoff marked "Arcos." I tried to silently will the bus driver to take that turn, but my psychic powers of persuasion failed me. The driver had only one destination in mind: Algeciras.

Let me give you some perspective about Algeciras. Rick Steves sums it up best: "Algeciras is only worth leaving." My Lonely Planet guide describes Algeciras thus: "The major port linking Spain with Africa: an industrial town, a big fishing port and a drug smuggling centre....unattractive and polluted." Then later the guide continues: "Be alert in the port, bus terminal, and market in the evening." And where was I headed? First to the port, and then the bus terminal. In the evening. I felt not a little nauseous.

Eventually we arrived, I waited in the brighest lights of the bus terminal, calmed my nerves by talking to Patrick, then later talking to Patra and Mom, and got on a return bus to Jerez (one that would actually stop there!). In Jerez I had to catch a taxi to Arcos, which was pricey but worth it to return to my own bed and hot shower, and Arcenses singing in the streets. In general, I can't say a lot of good came out the unexpected journey south. But there were a few moments when I was on the return bus to Jerez when I looked out my window and the lights of Tangiers, Africa pierced the night sky from across the water. Africa, so close that signs in Algeciras are in Spanish and Arabic, and on board my bus I heard the music of Moroccan French mixed with Arabic and Spanish (while meanwhile the Mexican-looking man across the aisle from me was reading "For Whom the Bell Tolls" in English).

As Mom reminded me during our conversation, it can be frustrating to have plans spoilt or expectations frustrated. But in the wreckage (in this case, of my nerves and wallet), there are equally unexpected joys. And perhaps that's the lesson: the beauty present in these situations is all the more poignant.

Que vistas mas bonitas...

In the absence of news, I give you views:

A view of the Arcos cliff from down near the bus station

The castle and Cathedral of Santa Maria in the background

View of the Cathedral of San Pedro from my terrace

View of the lake and mountains beyond from my terrace

Practicing my buleria steps on the terrace

All Souls

Once again, the whole town congregated in one place today, so Patra and I naturally had to be there; this time we convinced Erika to go along. Under forbidding gray skies, the three of us made our way down from the old town, up past the new town, and into the municipal cemetery. Families were flocking through the gates with flowers in hand, or purchasing bouquets from the extensive supply being sold outside.

Inside, the space around the white tombs burst with color and noise. Hundreds of Spaniards had come to clean the headstones of their ancestors and leave red, white, purple carnations, lilies, roses. I felt a little guilty at being a tourist of sorts at this personal ceremony of remembrance, and the camera I had brought with me certainly did not come out of my bag. However, the general atmosphere seemed more joyful than sad—I saw three of my students, and they all waved at me and grinned hugely. We felt somber at the far end of the cemetery, though, where hundreds of spaces wait for bodies to fill them (caskets here, as in most of Europe, are stored aboveground). We noticed that a few of the slots had been very recently filled—as recently as October 23rd—and the families who came to visit were understandably more freshly grieving. The rain started then, and we left that quiet part of the cemetery to once again enter the bustling aisles of the dead—people pushing and praying and saying hello to neighbors and cleaning and arranging flowers. We didn’t exactly belong, but we felt lucky to be accepted as part of the mass.

Inside the fortress

Sometimes in life you encounter something very beautiful, so beautiful that you interpose a camera lens between you and the experience in front of you. Whether this captures the memory of the experience forever or negates the possibility of that experience is debatable. For me, picture taking can become frantic when every turn presents an incredible new scene, as though digital memory is more important or long lasting than sensory memory. Today, though, I couldn’t help myself; I took something like 60 pictures. For your consideration: the Alcázar of Sevilla.