Febrero

Requena
The second week in February, there was an expo for cured meats and wine (Muestra de embutido) in Requena. I went with a group of friends with an organized tour group from Valencia. It was nice to get out of the city for a day. The train ride was lovely with lots of mountains and trees to see. We met at 9am and were in Requena by 11am. We then walked to the city center and went to see some caves that date back to the middle ages that are under the city. The caves were discovered when a construction truck fell through the ground. They were used as shelter from war and was a place where wine was made and stored. The majority of the people in our tour group were foreigners and some did speak Spanish well. Our tour guide for the caves spoke really quickly and she was asked to slow down. Every time someone asked, she said okay and then didn't slow down.

After the tour of the caves, we walked to the tents where the expo was. Each of us got 10 tickets, a cardboard "plate" that came with a glass wine glass and a plastic bowl. There were lots of people and long lines. We waited in one line and they filled our bowls with at least 8 different types of sausage. We tried all of them, some were spicer than others, some were chewy and some were rather dry, but they were better with a sip of red wine. Our train didn't leave until 4pm so we walked around the two tents, tried all the cured meat and wine we could handle.

Badajoz
The following Friday, I went to Badajoz for Carnaval with Morgan and two of her friends. I had to take the 2:45am bus from Valencia to Albacete. I got to the bus station around 2:30 and sat down to wait for the bus. Around 2:40 I didn't see it, so I asked a bus driver who told me I was waiting on the wrong side of the station. That explained so much. I had to run with all my things and barely caught the bus. It was about to pull out from the platform, luckily the bus driver was nice and helped me put my backpack away. He told me I was lucky and I believed him. At 5am, we arrived in Albacete where Morgan and Harmon were waiting for me. From there it was another 5 hours until we reached Badajoz. Morgan and I went to visit at the high schools we worked at last year. It was really nice to visit with some of the teachers and to see my students from last year.

We stayed with our friend, Alonso, who had an extra seven people staying in his house. It felt good to be back in Badajoz, to walk around the familiar streets and to visit with friends. Some of the friends I had made last year who were doing their Erasmus year came back to visit for Carnaval. It was great to see them and catch up. Though it did feel a bit weird to have the feeling like I wanted to go home to my apartment from last year, even though my home was no longer in Badajoz. We dressed up on Saturday night and ran into friends who were out and about. On Sunday we saw part of the parade with the different comparsas. We also stumbled upon a concert that was given by a group of guys who were in a murga. The murgas are musical theater groups that are usually composed of men. They create songs with commentary about events that happened in the past year. Here's a video of what they performed at the club. It wasn't as elaborate as this show, but they were all in costume. They were semifinalists this year and were really entertaining.




Vicky and Harmon had never been to Lisbon, so we took a day trip there on Monday. The weather was fantastic and we really enjoyed the four hours or so we spent there. We even made a friend from Brazil who joined us for lunch.

We had plans to have dinner with Granada, a friend from last year, on Monday night. So we had to rush to find items for a costume and then walk to Lo Nuestro to meet her. Harmon and I bought colorful wigs and Morgan and Vicky bought colorful boas. When we got to the restaurant it was really crowded because a murga was performing at 9pm. We had no idea there was going to be a performance there when we decided on having dinner there. After the performance, which took place behind the bar, we were able to sit at a table and eat all the tapas we possibly could. Dinner went by too quickly and before we knew it, it was time to go back to Alonso's house and pack our bags. We were leaving bright and early the next morning. So we got dressed in our brightly colored wigs and boas and ventured out to join the crowds of people. We danced a lot, saw lots of clever costumes and even got to enjoy the music of the comparsas one last time.

Oh Valenciaaaaaaaaaaa!

These last six months have flown by. Sorry I haven't blogged during my stay here in Valencia, I feel like I'm always running around from one place to another.

Quick update (October - January)

Playa de la Malvarrosa

I was lucky enough to find an apartment with two Spaniards, one guy and one girl. I'm not living near the city center, but I really like my living situation. I'm 20 minutes from the beach by bus, close to the Rio and La Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias. The river Turia used to flow through the city, but after floods in the '50s they converted the space into a park and everyone still refers to it as "el rio."

Also, there is a bike route from my house to the school I work at, which is really convenient.
It's in the city and is a good 45 minute walk/25 minute bike ride/bus ride away from my house.

Oh! And there is another English assistant at my school, though we are not in the same program. She is from Turkey and is one of the kindest people I've ever met. We have a lot of fun working together, teaching each other things about our different cultures and learning a lot about Spanish and Valencian culture. The majority of the children are interested in learning English and they are always ready to share random stories, even if they may tell me in Castellano or Valenciano.

I have a great group of friends here. Most of us are in our second year as auxiliares, but there are two who are in their third year of being in Spain. We get together on the weekends for potlucks and even go to trivia at an American bar on Sunday evenings. We're known as "The Americans," and we're not very good, but we're not too bad either. With out powers combined, we win lots of spot prizes, things like free canas and 2 for 1 lunch coupons, though we never seem to get more than 30/40 points. The questions are aimed for people who are at least 5 years older than we are. It's fun though, we learn lots of random facts and get to test our knowledge.

Though the winter here was mild, it was very humid. The apartment buildings are built to let hot air out and keep the apartments cool. This is not a nice thing in the winter.

For Christmas, I went to Zielitz on the 20th and missed the Christmas concert at school. Each class from first through sixth grade sang at least one song in English. Songs were also sung in French, Italian, Turkish and Greek. The theme for the school year is "The Mediterranean," so classes sang songs from various countries that border the Mediterranean. The nice thing about arriving to Germany on the 21st was that I was able to be there for Tobias' birthday and Bastian's class party! Both celebrations were really nice. There was no snow this year, but it was still lovely.

Renato, Sally, Lia and me on NYE

 I spent New Year's Eve in Madrid with friends I had made last year in Badajoz. We went to Puerta del Sol with a bag full of grapes around 11:40. When the first bell rang 12 seconds before midnight, we began the Spanish tradition of eating one grape every second for the 12 seconds before midnight. This is supposed to bring you good luck. However, it didn't go very smoothly. We panicked when we heard the first bell so Lia, Sally and I began laughing because we realized we had put too many grapes in our mouths but in the end, we somehow managed to eat all 12.



Lia and I stayed in Madrid for about week with our friend Inma, who is from Badajoz but is studying in Madrid. We all ate the "Roscon de Reyes" or King's cake and Inma found the figurine of one of the Three Kings. She got to wear a crown and is supposed to have good luck this year.

We went to Toledo for a day. It is only an hour's bus ride away from Madrid and buses leave every 30 minutes from 9am to 10pm. Toledo is beautiful, the buildings are well preserved, it has a mosque, cathedral and synagogues and is filled with history. It is known for steel, jewelry and being the capital of the Spanish Empire. There is even a tv show called "Toledo" that is on tv now.



At the end of the month, my Mom visited me! That was a real treat. We went to a couple of museums, el mercado central, ate Paella Valenciana, had coffee with some of my coworkers and enjoyed spending time with each other. She met all my friends and even made amazing chili and cornbread that was taken to a friend's house for a potluck dinner.

Goodbyes? Really?

Two weeks ago I had my last week with primero Bachillerato, Comercio, and Marketing. During class with Comercio, Inma was talking to me about what we should do for the next classes and then she paused and realized that I won't be there for any more of their classes. So I told them in many different ways that it was our last class together and that I am leaving for the States on June 2. Most understood the second week of June or that there was something special about this class. Inma had to step in and translate what I said for them. They were a little sad and suggested we go out to breakfast, sing karaoke together, or party. At the end of the class, the students lined up, shook my hand, gave me dos besos and told me "Nice to meet you, Anacelia." I only saw them once every 5 weeks, but still it was enough time to get to know the classes and to know who participates, who's shy, and who treats me like a celebrity shouting my name as they pass me in the hallway.

In one class with Maribel the students had an exam during the next period over the Baroque period in Spanish Literature. Everyone had their books open and was quiet going over their notes when I walked in. Maribel and I tried speaking with them about their Easter breaks, but most of them still had their noses in their books. So we asked them about the material their test was over. One guy who never says more than four words a class, spoke so well about the Baroque period. I was so impressed. The next day I had class with that same class, we talked about technology, and at the end of the class, one of students who sits in front and is pretty quiet most of the time told me, "It was a good class. Thanks." That made me real happy.

Last week I had my last full week with the elementary school kids. We had a good week of classes; we played a few games of Simon Says, reviewed for science tests, and went over Countries and Capital Cities in the European Union. I'm not sure if they all knew it was my last week with them.

Today I had class with the youngest students in the high school. When I walked into the bilingual class, they clapped and cheered for me. As exams are approaching, they are extra excited to have conversation classes with me to relieve them of doing "real" work. Carlos, the teacher, asked why they never clap for him when he walks in the classroom, so the students started clapping again. They are too funny.

Adventures during Semana Santa Part 1: Cordoba

For Easter, we got an entire week and a day off. This break was so nice as all of the students and teachers were ready for a break. For us auxiliares, we had a total of 11 days free for traveling. I traveled with two other auxiliares, Simon and Ariela, to four different cities in 10 days.

CORDOBA
We started on Friday the 15th and went to Cordoba for one night. I've heard that "Cordoba es preciosa" and that the Mezquita is incredible. Both of those things I found to be true. After dropping off our things in our surprisingly nice, private triple we walked around the city a bit. While we were close to the Mezquita, I got shat on by a bird. It's funny because it's true. I was taking a picture, heard a noise and then looked at my shirt. Perhaps it didn't help that I was wearing red; I was the perfect target. I wonder how many tourists this happens to. Lucky for me I was wearing another layer, so could take off the first one. I imagine I looked pretty strange wearing a white tank top with my red t-shirt tied around my purse, but didn't care, I was a tourist! Aren't tourists stereotypically dressed ridiculously? It's fun to play into that stereotype every once in a while, no? Because of this incident we called ourselves "Team birdshit" for the rest of the trip.

We went to the most relaxing, best smelling tea cafe for a break after walking around a bit more. We ordered Moroccan tea with mint to share and each ordered a granizado or batido. I've been really wanting a coconut batido because the weather had been so hot before we left, between 32-35 degrees Centigrade and coconut batidos were one thing I loved getting while I was in San Cristobal. The granizado was refreshing because it was so cold and the tea was refreshing because of the mint. There was fresh fruit in the middle of the patio that was so fragrant. Oh, that's one thing that was really nice about Cordoba, there were patios as you entered each house/hostel/some buildings. It was a nice way to enjoy natural light, while staying cool indoors.

Saturday morning Simon and I went to visit the Mezquita which was pretty incredible. We thought we were  doing good with time until we realized we were on the opposite side of town from the bus station and didn't have much time to get there. For whatever reason, we were thinking our bus left at 2:30pm, but asked Ariela to check the bus tickets to make sure. Oh boy were we wrong, it was 1:49pm and our bus left at 2:00pm. Shit! So we started running to get to a main street in order to flag down a taxi. The first four that passed us were occupied, luckily the fifth one wasn't. We piled in, told the driver we had to catch a bus in 10 minutes and asked if he could go as fast as possible. He was pretty understanding and told us he'd do what he could. We got there right at 2 o'clock. Ariela ran to the bus to tell the bus driver to wait a couple of minutes. Simon and I ran in with all our luggage behind her and luckily the bus driver let us on. He was the greatest bus driver because he also gave us a little goody-bag with bottled water, peanuts, cookies and headphones. We didn't even realize we'd purchased tickets for the Alsa Supra bus, which is far nicer than the regular buses for the same price. We were so lucky, all because of that bird.

Let the rhythm take you over Badajooooooooooo

That's right. K. Rums changed Enrique's catchy lyrics to make them better suit the life in Badajoz. In the month of April, I was lucky enough to have not just one, but three friends visit me in lil ol' Badajoz.

Danny and Santi were driving down from Galicia and stopped by for a night while traveling down to Benalmádena. They were fortunate enough to have a car, even if it didn't have a radio or air conditioning. Luckily for them, the Spanish heat had yet to settle in. And lucky for me, I got to see them twice within a two week period! When they got here, Danny told me he wanted to see all of the old stuff, so we ventured up to Casco Antiguo. After seeing the alcazaba, the cathedral, plaza alta, and torre espantaperros we went for some cañas. For dinner we went to la esponja, the cool hang-out for university students because they have large portions of beer and food for cheap, only to find out it was closed! So we went next door, where you can also get "a metro" of beer or sangria, which is something like 1.5-2L. The next day I showed them Valdepasillas, the newer part of town, and Puerta de Palmas. They were here for less than 24 hours, but it was really good to hang out with them. They are in for a big adventure in Southern Spain.

Three days after their visit, Katie came to visit for four nights. She had been woofing near Barcelona and took me up on my offer of visiting Badajoz. Her first day here she explored Badajoz solo and had some interesting encounters with locals. I was in Valverde that week, so she came with me to school and to explore Valverde. Until this point, I hadn't really explored Valverde except for the school trip to the new park to plant trees a couple of weeks earlier. The principal told us to sit down in his office and was very serious when talking to us. Katie couldn't understand all he was saying so wasn't sure if I was in trouble because I hadn't explored the town. Fernando, the principal, is from Valverde de Leganés and is very proud of his town. He went as far as calling the mayor, to tell him we were going to go to his office and that he should give us a map of the town. We ventured into town and found the building Fernando was describing. We walk inside, ask if we're in the right building and are told there is a line waiting to speak to the mayor. While we were waiting we found maps of the town and found other reading materials, such as the Rutas del Jamón for the Province of Badajoz. We felt silly waiting because we were able to find the maps ourselves but knew we had to wait to speak to the mayor because he was expecting us. After waiting for about 20 minutes, the mayor walks out of his office, walks straight towards us and says, "Son las compañeras de Fernando? Vengan conmigo." So we follow him all of six steps to another door where he tells someone who we are and that we need a map. The man then walks down to the table with the maps, gives us one and opens it. He tell us something like, "well here's a map of the town and the numbers correspond to different buildings." We thanked him and left the building, bursting out with laughter as soon as we exited because it was so official. We later went for coffee and saw the mayor and his workers at the one coffee shop in town. Too funny.

Katie was introduced to all but one of my classes. One of the teachers really doesn't like one class, so she told us to explore the school and told me show Katie pictures of the school's various celebrations that are on the school's webpage. We were both a little surprised that the teacher would go as far to not even have class with the children that day. She was working with another class so that they could finish bracelets for their mom's for Mother's Day. The English classes that day turned into a Q&A session. I don't know if Katie realized she'd be so popular with the children or that she'd be showcased. She didn't seem to mind though. All of the questions began with, "Do you like..." "What's your favorite...?" One of the best questions was "Do you like your sister's name?" I think Katie had just as much fun answering the questions as the kids did asking them. The next day and even weeks later the children asked me about my friend Katie and when she'd be coming back to visit. The other day someone asked me how she was doing. Sweet kids.

Te quiero Barcelona

Para que sepan: this is a long post.

Barcelona, Barcelona, what to say about Barcelona?  I've wanted to go to Barcelona for some time now, even before I came to Spain, and by late March, I made it there.  My friend Susie from Beloit asked me if I had any interest in visiting Barcelona with her at the end of March. I told her I had every interest, found a cheap flight, booked it and had dreams with the song "Barcelona" by Giulia y Los Tellarini playing the background.

I had an evening flight from Sevilla on a Thursday and was nervous about making it on time. Everyone had told me that the airport was small and that I wouldn't have any problems, if the bus was on schedule. They were right, it took no time at all to check in and get through security, but the flight was delayed by an hour. This sucked because the flight only lasts for an hour and a half. So I arrived at the airport a little before midnight and had planned on taking the metro, but as soon as I got there I found out it wasn't an option as the metro stops running at midnight. On the plane, I sat by a nice Spanish woman who told me she was looking to take the aerobus (the shuttle to and from the city center to the airport) and asked me if I knew anything about it. I told her I was looking to take it as well, but knew nothing about it. We got to talking and it turns out the woman was from Badajoz, so she took a liking to me and wanted to help me get to where I was going. Win! We found out we had to take a night bus from Plaça de Catalunya. So she told me not to worry and asked around for me about which bus I needed. Less than 3 minutes later, the bus arrived.

The bus was quite full and after the first few stops, I felt like I was on the night bus from Harry Potter, because the bus driver was driving fast and making quick turns. There were interesting characters on the bus and people of all ages. I was the last person on the bus and the bus driver let me know when we had reached my destination. It was already past 1am at this point. Susie came to meet me near the bus stop as she had arrived to Barcelona in the afternoon.


We started early the next morning (Friday), picked up some pastries from a bakery and went to the metro. We explored La Rambla, which was really cool. There were lots of groups of school children out, which was a bit strange to see. I don't know if it was a big field trip day for all schools or just some. We saw lots of human statues and went to the famous market, La Boqueria or Mercat de Sant Josep, which is fantastic! There was so much fresh produce, meat, fish, spices, candies, dried fruit and nuts.

 We walked along the sea and then made our way to where the cathedral is. We stopped at a cafe and then took some sides streets and made our way into the Born neighborhood. One thing I really liked about Barcelona, was how there were small maps every block, so you could orient yourself and find where you would like to go. We stopped to look at a map so we could see how to get to La Esglesia de Santa Maria del Mar and realized we had to take a left.

 While we were walking on this random street, we see another Beloiter! I had seen Katie a week before in Benalmadena and knew she was staying in Barcelona for a while, but did not think I'd run into her! Seriously, what are the odds. She was wandering around the city trying to find the chocolate museum. She joined us for about an hour. We found the church, took some photos, asked around about the chocolate museum, and finally found the museum after getting a bit lost. We didn't go inside though because there were a long line of students waiting. How fun would that be? To go with your class to the chocolate museum or Museu de la Xocolata, as it's called in Catalan.

After lunch, we parted ways. Susie and I were on a mission to see La Sagrada Familia and Parque Guell. We were waiting to get on the metro and when the door opened, a woman ran out of the metro car and threw down a newspaper. The next thing I saw were hands reaching for people's purses and trying to get into people's pockets. Luckily, all of the people quickly realized what was going on and slapped their hands firmly on their purses and wallets and nothing was stolen. I've heard so much about pickpockets and their tricks, so to actually witness them was nuts.

La Sagrada Familia

La Sagrada Familia is amazing! We didn't enter because the line was long and it was getting late; we wanted to see Parque Guell before sunset. We were pretty close to the park from La Sagrada Familia on a map and didn't consult with anyone about the best metro stop for getting to the park. So we picked a stop that looked the closest and got off. Well we didn't really know where we were, so we asked a woman for directions who told us first in Spanish, then in English how to get there. She said to look out for the "mechanical stairs." Mechanical stairs, escalators, those are easy spot, right? Wrong.
We ended up walking up some stairs to walk across a pretty bridge and kept walking uphill for a good 20 minutes, before we realized we'd walked to far uphill and needed to go downhill to reach the park. Sure enough, as we started walking downhill we saw the dun dun dun, mechanical stairs! They only went up and there was a set of stairs besides the escalator to get down. We asked for directions one more time and found a look-out point where people were doing Tai Chi.

Picture from the cool look-out point.

The view was great and we could see the park was  just downhill from where we were. There were so many people at the park! We went in the back way, which is not what people normally do, but it worked for us. It was more calm the way we went in and we had a good adventure getting lost, finding the oh so known mechanical stairs and asking people for directions. Oh and I forgot to mention Susie wore flats this day. She's a real trooper for hiking in those shoes, Madre mia.

That evening we met up with a friend of a friend. Our friend Megan, who was also in Theta with us and is one of Susie's best friends, studied abroad in Barcelona a few years ago. She made friends with a really nice guy named Albert, they've kept in contact and Megan informed Albert of us visiting. Albert showed us around the bay area before and after eating dinner at a Syrian restaurant. We went out for some beers after dinner to a place called Barnabier, isn't that a great name? We sat outside and while we were enjoying our beers a massive group of people rollerblading passed by us. I had never seen anything like it, people of all ages, wearing neon colored vests and rollerblading around 11pm. It was fantastic.

Woman and Bird

Saturday (Susie had half a day left in Barcelona) we met up with Albert in the morning and he took us to a different part of the city so we could get another view and also see the Olympic Stadium from 1992, a Joan Miro Museum, and the Plaza de Espana. We took the Montjuïc funicular to get the top of the hill. The weather wasn't as good as it had been the day before, but it wasn't bad by any means.
We had a nice walk, were able to see Plaza de Espana in all it's glory with a brand new mall that was made in the old bullring. That was a crazy sight. We then walked around a park and sat for a while near the "Woman and Bird" Statue by Miro.

We got some lunch and then dipped our feet into the Mediterranean, NBD. By the time we were done, it was time to drop Susie off at the airport. Albert was kind enough to give me a ride back to my hostel which was on the other side of town. I slept because I had an early morning flight and was tired from all the walking we did. Also, the time was changing the morning I was flying, which made a little nervous that I'd get confused and get to the airport too late. It was silly, there was no reason to worry, but I checked out around 12:15am anyway, the guy working at the hostel told me I'd have plenty of time to have a little adventure in Plaza de Catalyuna before catching the bus. So I took the metro to Plaça de Catalunya and found Nitbus 17-the one that goes to the airport. I was the only person waiting for the bus around 1am. There were so many people walking around and going to various bars and getting food, it was a Saturday night, afterall. The bus driver stopped, got out of the bus and told me he was getting coffee and asked if I wanted some as well. I said, porque no? es una buena hora para tomar cafe. So we went inside the closest restaurant and had some cafe solo. While we were inside he told me in Spanish, It's much better to enjoy the coffee inside rather than getting it to go." I had to agree with him, it was nice to take a break. After coffee, we got on the bus and it was cool to see all the people bustling around the city at night.

The flight was fine, we landed in Sevilla just as the sun was rising. And as I got off the shuttle bus from the airport in Sevilla, I heard someone say my name. A friend of mine in Erasmus from France was saying goodbye to her parents that were just boarding the bus as I was getting off. What a nice surprise. We were riding the same bus back to Badajoz, so we walked and talked to the bus station. Sevilla is a beautiful city and seeing it with the sunrise was amazing. We also saw a few people who were still partying from the night before. 48 hours was not enough time in Barcelona, I hope to go back someday.

Major Update!

Oh goodness, it's been almost 3 months since I've last posted a blog. Que vida que tengo! My life has been busy these days with classes, private lessons and all the traveling I've been doing. I've gone to Germany, Salamanca and Lisbon and partook in the Carnaval fun since I last posted.

GERMANY

Sledding = FUN

I know Christmas was a while ago, so this bit is short and sweet. :) Christmas in Germany was fantastic. It was the first white Christmas I've had! My break was very relaxing and it was really nice to spend time with Pancho and his family. I'm so glad they let me stay with them for as long as I did. The food was great and the snow was so fun to play in. We went sledding almost every day and it was so much fun!!! The Christmas market was really cute, even though it was like -10 degrees Celsius (that's like 14 degrees Fahrenheit!) when we went.


SALAMANCA

Plaza Mayor, Salamanca, Spain

Astronaut in Cathedral

Salamanca was a fun trip. We went at the end of January, so it was quite cold and rainy.  The bus ride was 5 hours long with one stop. The ride there was really nice, the country side is so beautiful and there was even snow!  One of the other auxiliares, Morgan, studied in Salamanca while she was an undergrad, so she knew her way around. We stayed in a hostel in the Plaza Mayor, which was a terrific location. Salamanca isn't a very big city, but it feels larger than Badajoz. It's a beautiful city that has really pretty buildings, mainly cathedrals. It has one of the largest Universities in Spain, so the fiesta was real good. ;)  We walked around, saw the cathedrals and got a feel for the city. I loved how they have pinchos, individual tapas you can choose when you go to a restaurant/bar. They are delicious and have an assortment of pinchos at every restaurant. At some, if you get a cana (a small beer), your first pincho is only 0,50€! In the new cathedral there is an astronaut and an ice cream cone carved into the front that was done during the restoration. Also, on one of the University buildings there is a small frog carved on top of a skull. They say if you find the frog before a test, it will bring you good luck. So in all of the tourist shops there are lots of small green frogs you can buy or you can buy things with small green frogs or large green frogs on them. I guess it's like their unofficial mascot, in a way.

LISBOA

In mid February, I went to Lisbon with some friends to celebrate our friend Rick's birthday. We had some nice weather on Friday morning and all day Saturday, which was surprising because it always rains in Lisbon at some point in the day. We got there on Thursday night, took it easy and woke up early on Friday. We went to the Castle St. Jorge, I had gone there during the December puente, but the weather was much nicer this time around.
After seeing the castle, we went into a cathedral, and then decided we wanted to go to the beach. So we went back to the hostel, talked with the staff there and bought food for a picnic on the beach. The ride to Cascais was about 40 minutes. As we were approaching the end of the line, the weather looked worse and worse. By the time we go to the train station in Cascais, it was pouring. We stood by the bus station for a good 5 minutes debating what we should do. We decided to move to a covered government building and have our picnic there on the steps. We were all starving so it was the best picnic ever. We had chorizo, cheese, chicken, mustard, bread, doritos tex-mex (it's like nacho cheese but less strong of a flavor), campesino flavored chips that taste like sour cream and onion but are less salty and strawberries. Oh and we bought some boxed wine too.

The weather cleared up for about 15 minutes, so we left the site of our picnic and headed for the beach. We all took off our boots and socks, rolled up our pants and ran to the water. It was cold, but it was so nice to be on the beach, hearing the waves, and digging our feet in the sand. We weren't looking forward to the 40 minute ride back with cold feet. haha. It was fine though and we napped after getting back to the hostel.

Sometime between Lisbon and Carnaval, I made a giant apple pie.

CARNAVAL!

Carnaval. What to say about Carnaval? It was just as everyone had described. The size of Badajoz doubled for a weekend and people were out at all times of day, shopping, eating and watching the parades when they took place. My camera died during carnaval, but I managed to get some pictures before it did. On Friday, there was the children's parade, which consisted of 22 groups from all over Extremadura. They call the groups "Comparsas". Each group was dressed in elaborate costumes and had a small drumline to accompany the dancers parading down the street. There were children dressed in costumes that were watching the parade and there were people selling balloons. There was even a santa claus balloon for sale, a little funny.

She had a good view of the parade.

These groups work on their costumes, dances, and music all year. They practice in secret in the country. The little girl with the lady bug wings was too cute. She had a good view and by mid-parade, I did too because people who were in the front left. On Saturday, there were murgas practically all day. They had been on tv on canal extremadura all week, and were performing live in various locations around town. They wrote lyrics to melodies of popular songs and sang about social and political issues. They were ridiculous and were groups of people dressed in the same costume. On Saturday night, if you were going to go out after midnight, you HAD to wear a costume otherwise people might heckle you. On the website for Carnaval that had the schedule and tips of where to go, what to see, and how to get the most of out Carnaval in Badajoz, it said at least 3 times, It is strongly recommended that you wear a costume if you plan on being out after midnight. The website wasn't kidding. I went out to Plaza de Minayo and there was a HUGE botellon that was on multiple streets, in multiple Plazas. There were so many people of all ages dressed in costume, drinking in the street, and having a good time. The city brought in really nice portopotties. I wish they were around all the time. It's hard to find public restrooms here. 

My friend Stephanie and I were dressed as nerds. I wanted to be able to wear suspenders with my costume. A little silly, but hey, it was Carnaval. When we tried describing nerds to people, they just said, "Oh Urkel!" referring to Steve Urkel from Family Matters. 

Stephanie and I dressed in our nerd costumes. We had great colorful socks with flowers and ked-like shoes, but you can't see them. 

I wish I had pictures from the adult parade on Sunday because they wore the same costumes as the children, only there were about 100 adults in each group with crazy big drumlines. Stephanie and I went to get bocadititos before the parade because we thought it started at 3pm, but we got to the street where it was and there was no one there. The parade started about an hour later, just as we were done eating. Though when we returned to the street, it was full of people. It started raining about 5 minutes after we found a spot to stand, so we moved under the bus stop. You would think that standing under a covered bus stop would keep you dry, but we actually got more wet than we would've if we were standing outside. There were people who had their umbrellas open, but were standing halfway under the bus stop. The rain water would drip down their umbrellas and onto Stephanie and me. No fun! I moved an umbrella a few times, but it wasn't worth it. Why would you do that? Stand under a covered area with your umbrella poking out in the rain? Silly ladies. 

Photo Taken by Stephanie

So we moved by El Corte Ingles (a huge department store) and the rain calmed down enough for us to find a new spot to stand. While we were at our new spot, the cutest little boy was next to us. His dad was holding him and he was wearing a winnie-the-pooh costume. He had a balloon and kept giving us the balloon. The groups were so good and their costumes were amazing. They had a long way to walk/dance in the parade. We saw them towards the start of the parade. The music reminded me of being at football games because it gets you really pumped-up and makes you want to dance. There was one group that played the theme song from "Pirates of the Caribbean" which was really random, but was also really well done. 

Monday night was an even bigger party night. The comparsas were out in the plazas, dressed in their costumes, playing their drums and dancing. My friends and I dressed as ninjas this night. We had plastic swords and nunchucks. Too fun. So I found out that everyone stays up all night and goes to San Roque (a barrio in town) at 8am for the burying of the sardine. It signifies the end of Carnaval. My friends and I did this and stayed out in costume, dancing in the rain until the parade began. We lasted until about 1pm and then made our back to town so we could all go home and sleep. What a weekend!