The muffin man? The muffin man! Do you know the muffin man, who lives in a small town in Spain?
I do not personally know the muffin man, but I have met him once. For spring break, I went with my friend J to stay at his family's house in a small town in rural Zamora, Spain. When I say small town, I mean a town with a population slightly larger than my graduating class in high school. Knowing I'm a city-slicker, J was concerned that I wouldn't enjoy my stay in a such tiny town surrounded by nature. I, on the other hand, was looking forward to relaxing in the country, taking walks and reading books.
The town
The first evening, we took a walk to the nearby train station and some of the surrounding countryside. Looking at the fields and flowers was worth the freezing cold we had to deal with.
Don't worry. This section of track was no longer in use.
The next morning, as I was trying to force myself out of the warmth of the pile of blankets on my bed and into the cold air to start the day, I heard a long, low whistle. Knowing that we were relatively close to the train station I assumed that it was the morning train alerting us of its presence. When my friend awoke, I excitedly told him that I could hear the train whistle.
"No, you didn't," he replied.
"Yes. Listen, there it is again."
"That's not the train," he said. "That's the baker."
"The baker?" I asked, unsure if he was telling the truth or just pulling my leg. "What, does the baker have an alarm that goes off that tells the town when there is fresh bread or something?"
"Not exactly. That's the sound of the car horn telling you that the baker has arrived in town with his van full of bread. If you want bread, you just go outside and buy it from him. Or, you can go to his house and buy the bread from there."
Now, the concept of buying bread from the van of a roving baker was completely foreign to me, but is an everyday occurrence in small Spanish towns, so you can imagine the look of both disbelief and enthusiasm that crossed my face at that point. Excitedly, I asked if we could buy bread from the van at least once during our stay. J smiled and said that if I wanted some, all I had to do was go outside and buy it.
For breakfast that morning, and for the next several mornings, we had some of the most delicious muffins I had ever eaten. With only one muffin remaining, I asked J where we could get more. He told me that if I wanted more, I could either go to the baker's house or wait for the van to come around the following day. Despite the town having only two main streets, I knew that with my sense of direction I probably wouldn't be able to find the baker's house and make my way back to his house without losing a couple of hours, so I decided that waiting for the van was the best option. Nervous about taking on this endeavor, I asked J where the van would be and at approximately what time it would arrive so I would be ready and we wouldn't have to go a day without the muffins. He told me that the baker usually arrived before 11am and that I should first go left upon exiting the house and if he wasn't there, to go to the right.
The following morning, I woke up early to make sure that I didn't miss the arrival of the muffin man. As I was getting dressed, I heard the sound of the car horn. I hastily threw on the rest of my clothes, grabbed my wallet and ran out the door. I looked to the left and there was no van. Then I looked to the right. Still no van. Worried that I may have missed the van and therefore my chance to eat more delicious muffins, I decided to walk a little further up the street to see if I could find it. When I reached the intersection at the end of the street and still didn't see the van, I felt a bit discouraged, so I decided to return home, grab my camera and take a walk around town. Not wanting to go back down the same street because I didn't want the old man sitting outside to think I was stupid, I took a different route. I just had to keep telling myself that if I turned left three more times, I would make it.
Upon arriving at the house, my friend asked where I had gone. I told him that I had gone to get muffins, but that I couldn't find the van. He laughed and told me that the baker was probably still a ways away and that I would know it when he arrived. I decided to chance it and go on with my walk as planned and hoped that I would find the muffin man while out exploring. As I left the house, I saw a white van parked up the street and suddenly heard a long, loud blast of a car horn. One by one, the residents of the town began leaving their houses and walking towards the van. I joined the procession nervously. As the people were congregating around the van, I felt uncomfortable as I could feel all of their eyes looking at the giant foreigner. Not only was I not from there, but I was dressed as a tourist with my university sweatshirt, backpack, and camera and I was at least a full head taller than everyone else. Then, I asked for two bags of muffins, which seemed to surprise everyone, but especially the baker. I quickly left and took my treasure to the house so I could get on with my exploration of the town.
If you are reading this, you have probably been waiting in anticipation to find out if I made a successful visit to the castle. If you are unfamiliar with what happened on my first attempt at visiting this castle, please click here to find out about the necessity of a second visit. The good news is that I made it to the castle. The better news is that I managed to do it without getting arrested or killed. Normally, I try to avoid anything excessively dangerous or things that could land me in potential legal trouble, but I was determined to make it to the castle before the weather turned bad.
Still doubting the legality of walking along the shoulder of the highway, I posed the question to my friends before embarking on this adventure. The response I received was that as long as there were no signs explicitly prohibiting walking the on the shoulder, it was not illegal. This isn't to say that it is legal, but at least I probably wouldn't be arrested if I were to attempt it. On the chance that I did get stopped by a law enforcement officer, I planned this excursion for the day my foreigner card expired, so that if I did get arrested, I was still in the country. In fact, I was so preoccupied about getting arrested that not only did I plan this trip around the expiration date of my card, I also took with me my passport and official, stamped application that showed I had applied to renew my identification card a month prior. On a side note, I am still waiting for the government to process my renewal paperwork, a process I began now two months ago, which will be a subject for another post.
After the now familiar, train, metro, bus trip, I found myself facing a sign that pointed me in the right direction. I started down the highway in the direction indicated by the sign. As always, click on the picture to see a larger version.
I was so excited when I finally arrived at the castle that I started taking pictures of everything. The castle was smaller than I had expected, but that made it more beautiful.
I spent a couple of hours at the castle and felt the visitwas completely worth my while, and did not regret making the trek along the highway to get there, until I saw some of the local wildlife. As you know from my previous post, I do not have a soft spot in my heart for spiders. What I didn't tell you was that also near top of my list of my least favorite animals are caterpillars. During my time at the exploring the castle grounds, I saw some of the biggest spiders and caterpillars that I had ever seen in the wild. On several occasions I had to move to a new place to eat my lunch because I was sitting too close to a spider web. I knew my time at the castle was complete when, while sitting under a tree, I heard a loud plop and thought it was just an acorn. Until it moved. I realized the "plop" was a huge caterpillar that had fallen from one of the trees. Terrified that one would land on my head, I packed up the rest of my belongings and left as quickly as I could. The least frightening of the animals were the lizards, as they usually scurried away from me before I could get a decent picture of them. However, sometimes they would dart away before I could even see them, having me convinced with the rustling of the leaves that some particularly menacing creature (a spider) was going jump out of the foliage and attack me.
On the way to the castle, I noticed the following sign, and considered following the hiking trail back to the bus stop during the return journey if there was time. I stopped at the signs again on the return trip, and remembering what happened the last time I tried to follow this trail (in the opposite direction), I decided that if I actually wanted to catch the return bus and not encounter any more wildlife that I should stick to the highway.
Basque words of the day:
Armiarma - spider
Beldar - caterpillar
Gaztelu - castle
While I was back in Seattle, I watched the t.v. show America's Got Talent, a live talent competition to find the next headline act. There were many acts that I enjoyed, but one that seemed permanently engrained in my mind, not because it was particularly good, (because it wasn't) but because it was catchy. You probably don't care at all about this information, but it is essential in fully appreciating the story that follows. The following video is the act that will forever live in my mind. I suggest starting at 0:45, as the beginning is not relevant to the story.
Do you now have the song's chorus stuck in your head yet? Good. If not, repeat the video until you can't escape the sound of the bearded children singing "That's probably a bad idea". Throughout the following story, there will be several instances where this phrase will come into play. I encourage you to repeat it with me in the style of the bearded children each time that it appears.
A few months ago while I was searching the internet, most likely for something completely unrelated, I found a photo of a castle. I happen to have a special fondness for castles, especially those with round towers, and when I first saw the picture of the Castillo de Butrón, I knew I had to visit it. As I began to look into how to get there, I realized that it was going to be more difficult than I had originally anticipated, because there was no transportation directly to the castle.
After several many hours of searching travel sites, bus schedules, and Google Maps, I found a route that would get me fairly close to the castle. The nearest bus stop was approximately three kilometers from the castle (about 1.8 miles), but I was more than willing to walk the distance. According to Google Maps, there were two possible routes from the bus stop to my destination. Option one: I could take the slightly more direct route and walk on the narrow shoulder of the highway (that's probably a bad idea) or option two: I could take a smaller road that wound its way through fields and a small forest. Doubtful of the legality of walking on the shoulder of the highway and fearful of being hit by a car, I chose the smaller, more indirect route. It was fairly simple, once I got off the bus I was to turn right and follow the road. According to the map, the road branched at several places, but as long as I stayed to the right, I should be able to get there without too much trouble. For those of you who have had experience with my sense of direction, you should be saying "That's probably a bad idea". I should mention that because this was an aerial map, parts of the road were obscured by trees, but I figured I would be able to handle it. After checking the weather report and feeling about as prepared as I could be, I decided to embark on this adventure. I decided to go alone because I tend to take far fewer pictures if I am with other people. (That's probably a bad idea.)
The adventure began mid-morning, which was significantly later than I had hoped because I had overslept my alarm by about two hours. After an interesting train ride that left me slightly uncomfortable, I took a 40 minute ride on the metro to where I needed to catch the bus. Upon exiting the metro, I promptly turned and walked in the opposite direction of the bus stop (I never said I had a good sense of direction), and arrived at what I thought was the correct stop. Without any signs stating which buses used that stop, I was unsure that I was in the right place. As the bus only came once an hour and there were about 10 minutes until the next departure, I began to get nervous and did what any reasonable person would do at this point, I went to the tourist office where I was told that the correct stop was just on the other side of the metro station. Perfect. I crossed the bridge over the tracks and made it with plenty of time to spare.
Two and a half hours after leaving my house, I stepped off the bus onto the side of the highway and began walking up the road to my right. The fields and spacing of the houses looked like what I had seen on Google Maps, so I was fairly certain that I was headed in the right direction. I had been walking for about five minutes when I noticed some cows in a field. I have always liked taking pictures of the local wildlife, so these cows were no exception. As soon as I got close enough to get a decent picture, the cows sensed that I was there and stopped eating to stare at me. I'm used to being stared at, as tall blonde Americans aren't exactly commonplace here, but being stared at by these cows was more unnerving than being stared at by almost any person. Maybe it was their size, or the fact that the only thing keeping them from me was a small rope that they could probably step over if they wanted to, but I felt very out of place and thought of my excursion, "That's probably a bad idea". As am standing in the middle of the road like a typical tourist taking pictures of cows and contemplating running in the opposite direction, two joggers passed me and the cows didn't even flinch. Not one bit. Apparently these were intelligent cows that could tell difference between someone who belonged in the area and a tourist.
Since I had already disturbed the cows' late morning snack, I decided there was no harm in continuing my journey. I continued up the road, remembering to keep to the right every time it split. A bit farther down the road, I spied some grapevines. As I am from the city, I had never seen real grapevines before, so of course I stopped to take a picture. In the middle of my picture taking, I managed to alarm a small dog tied to a house next to the road. Upon seeing me, the dog decided that it was necessary to sound the alarm to every other dog within hearing distance. Now there were at least six (yes, I counted) dogs barking, their noise echoing throughout the entire valley. I quickened my pace up the road for fear that one of the dogs would escape and chase me down, all the while thinking to myself, "That's probably a bad idea". The paved road ended an a well-worn path began. Thinking that the map wouldn't show such great detail, I continued up the path where I entered into the cover of the trees. At this point, the path split into three, all going in more or less the same direction. I know what you're thinking; me walking into the woods by myself with my sense of direction, "That's probably a bad idea". I had the same thought, but out of sheer determination and curiosity, I continued down the leftmost path. That is, until, just a few feet down the path, I ran into my arch nemesis. Literally.
At the top of the list of things that will hinder my accomplishing any task are spiders. I detest and fear them. I have been known to take the entire contents of my bed to another room in the house to sleep because I saw a spider in my bedroom and it hid before I could get someone to kill it for me. As I passed along a fence I felt a sticky thread of the web of doom on my arm. Thinking I had just grazed it with my arm I pulled it off and took another step. When I looked down, I realized that I didn't just graze it with my arm, I had walked through the entire giant spider web and the majority of it was stuck to my pants just above my knee, dead fly and all. At this point, I started panicking, wondering where the actual spider could be. I promptly began a rendition of the I-just-walked-into-a-spider-web-get-it-off-me dance. You know the one. The one that looks like a high speed version of the Hokey-Pokey on drugs. Yes, that one. Noticing that the dead fly was still attached to my knee, I tried to lift it off with a pencil from my bag. I got rid of the fly, and should probably get rid of the pencil as well, as it is still covered with the web of doom. I took the spider web as a sign that going down that path was "probably a bad idea" and decided to turn around, hoping the spider wasn't following.
I could have continued down one of the other paths (that's probably a bad idea), but afraid of running into more of my eight-legged "friends", I went back the way I came, knowing that I could take the highway if I still wanted to go to the castle. I walked quickly past the barking dogs and back towards the field with the cows. As I approached, the cows began to moo loudly, which worried me. After I had passed them, the farmer let his dogs out and they began to follow me down the road. I did not want to add dogs to the list of animals that were potentially following me so I walked faster and didn't look back. When I arrived at the bus stop, I debated walking alongside the highway, but as the clouds had darkened significantly and I wasn't carrying a jacket, I decided to wait for the next bus back to town. While waiting, a man driving a car entered the highway from the side street next to the bus stop and offered me a ride. I graciously turned him down, remembering all of the advice I had heard as a child and thinking, "That's probably a bad idea".
When I got back home, I looked at the map to see if the path would have taken me in the right direction, and as it turns out, it wouldn't have. I should have continued down a road that looked like a private driveway, instead of taking the road that passed the barking dogs. The next time I attempt this excursion, and there will be a next time, I will walk along the highway because, although there is greater danger from the passing vehicles, there should be no spider webs to stand in my way.
A: Speak to them in a language other than English.
Before you get angry and start giving me the evil eye, let me explain. Americans are not generally known for being multilingual. In fact, it is commonly assumed that Americans don't learn other languages because at this point in time the primary language of international and intercultural communication is English. We can get by without having to resort to a second or third language. That being said, I know many Americans who are, if not fluent, at least proficient in another language. Despite this fact, the stereotype remains, as illustrated by the following joke.
Two highway workers were busy working at a construction site when a big car with diplomatic license plates pulled up. "Parlez-vous français?" the driver asks them. The two workers just stared.
"Sprechen Sie Deutsch?" The two continued to stare at him.
"Fala português?" Neither worker said anything.
"¿Habla español?" Still no response. Finally, the man drives off in disgust.
One worker turned to the other and said, "Gee, maybe we should learn a foreign language..."
"What for? That guy knew four of them and what good did it do him?"
The reason for this post is that I experienced a situation similar to the previous joke a couple of days ago. Despite being a native English speaker, having a decent level of proficiency in Spanish, being in second year Basque, and having briefly studied a few other languages, I found myself in the same position as the highway workers.
I had planned an interesting day trip for myself on Friday (more about the actual trip in a later post) and having just bought my train ticket to Bilbao, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around to see an older man holding a map and seemingly in need of directions. I said "Hola", as I usually would when someone taps me on the shoulder, and the response I received was "Bilbao?" while pointing to Bilbao on the map. When I didn't receive a response in Spanish, I switched to English and tried to explain how to catch the train. I tried to show him where we were on the map so he could orient himself, but Durango is a small enough city that it wasn't there. After realizing that he didn't speak more than a few words of English, I resorted to pointing to signs and timetables. He seemed to understand, and I went on my way, feeling bad that I wasn't able to speak to him in his own language.
Since I was also going to Bilbao, we ended up on the same train. In fact, we ended up sitting across from each other. It was still morning, and I hadn't been awake for that long, so I was hoping to be left alone with my thoughts or my music for the duration of the train ride. My new-found friend, on the other hand, had other plans. As it turns out, he was a bit of a talker. Our "conversation" began with him asking directions from Bilbao to Santander and then to Gijón. I put conversation in quotation marks because what went on between us wasn't really a conversation, since neither one could understand the other. It was more like a strange game of charades that allowed talking in snippets of five or six different languages. With these special rules, you were not allowed to say more than four words in one language without switching to another. Not having been born bilingual, I'm not the best at code-switching even when I know both languages. I tend to get stuck in one of them and have a difficult time following the conversation when words of the other language are thrown in at random. Imagine my confusion when having to follow the code-switching between languages I don't understand.
Despite our lack of a common language, I managed to get lectured about my relative inability to speak neither German nor French. He was of the opinion that because I could speak English that I should be able to speak German because they are related. He thought the same about Spanish and French, and then proceeded to list all of the romance languages that he thought I should speak. While knowing one language that is closely related to another often makes it easier to learn, it doesn't mean that they are mutually intelligible and that understanding one automatically means you will understand the other. Not only was I lectured about about languages, but about my exercise habits and my choice of profession as well. Apparently teachers work a lot and don't make a whole lot of money (that's a shocker) and I would be much better off becoming a doctor or a lawyer. I do not want to be a doctor or a lawyer, I want to be a teacher. Now feeling a little uncomfortable, I got off the train at the first stop in Bilbao leaving him to exit at the second stop, where hopefully he could find someone who had a better sense of direction than I did or could at least speak to him in a language he could understand.
Have you ever played the game of code-switching charades or had difficulties finding a common language to communicate in?
It's been a long time since my last post, and I'm sure some of you must have thought that I had fallen off the face of the earth. The good news for you is that I have not fallen of the face of the earth, unless, of course, you were hoping that is what happened to me. In that case, I am sorry to disappoint you. Now that I know I have a couple of readers besides my parents, I will attempt to post more frequently. The key word here is attempt. Keeping up with my blog hasn't been at the top of my priority list.
After finishing my teaching at the end of May, several of my friends helped to prepare me for the upcoming Basque exam. I was so nervous, specifically about the oral exam, that I wasn't sure I was going to pass, especially considering my previous performance. During the mid-term exam in January, I got so nervous during the oral exam that I almost completely forgot my name. This time, though, I remembered not only my name, but everything else I was supposed to know as well, and passed both the written and oral parts. I know enough that I could probably hold my own in a conversation with a three-year-old.
Shortly after finishing the Basque exam and before heading back to the United States for a long vacation, I went with the choir to the town of Sodupe for a concert. However, this was not just an ordinary concert, this was a gathering of many of the choirs from Bizkaia, numbering close to 1,000 people. If you have ever been around choir people, imagine putting 1,000 of us in the same room. It was crazy, but incredibly fun.
Part of the crowd
After that, I packed my bags and headed to Seattle for my little brother's high school graduation, visit family and friends, and play tourist. What follows are some photos of how I have spent my vacation, because pictures are usually more entertaining than words.
This summer I:
watched my little brother graduate from high school,
Posing for a picture with my family after the ceremony
went to several Seattle Mariners baseball games
watched the 4th of July fireworks with my mom and my friends,
took a road trip to Spokane with my sister to visit more family,
Hiking Tubbs Hill with my sister, aunt, and uncle
Standing with my sister at the edge of the Columbia River
When it comes to taking pictures, I am definitely my mother's daughter. Two years ago, my mom came to visit me when I was studying in Granada and we took a three-week trip through Spain, Germany, and Austria. During this trip, I shot about 500 pictures; she shot approximately 2,000. I couldn't believe that she could take so many pictures in such a short period of time, and gave her a bad time about it. As it turns out, I have inherited the gene for taking massive amounts of pictures in a short period of time. Over Semana Santa (Easter holidays), I spent 12 days traveling through Budapest and Prague, where I took an astonishing 1,087 photos.
It is commonly said that a picture is worth 1,000 words. If that were entirely true, then this post should be 1,087,000 words long, assuming I can do math correctly. Luckily for you all, I have never written that many words on a single topic in my entire life, and I don't plan on starting today.
Seeing as how free time is at a premium right now, instead of attempting to write down all of my adventures, which might actually bring me close to a total of 1,000,000 words, I am going to give a brief rundown of the trip followed by a few of my favorite pictures.
Total number of days: 12
Countries visited: 2 (Hungary and Czech Republic)
Cities visited: 3 (Budapest, Prague, Kutná Hora)
Hours spent on a bus :16 (Budapest to Prague and back)
Concerts attended: 3 (two in Prague and one in Budapest)
Dictionaries acquired: 3 (English-Czech, English-Hungarian, and English-Romanian)
Friends made: several
Relatives visited: 1
What is one of the first things people do when they move to a foreign country after they have found housing? Normal people would answer that they would open a bank account or find the nearest grocery store. What is one of the first things I did? I joined a choir. I went to the tourism office about a week ago to see if there were any choirs in the area that could use another member until the end of may. The woman gave me the names of three different groups, one had just a phone number, and the other had an email address. I decided to email first, because my written Spanish is better than my spoken. It turns out that the choir I emailed, the Orféon Durangués, is a very well-known group in the area. They quickly responded to my request for information and said that they were excited for me to join them as soon as possible.
On Tuesday, I went to my first rehearsal, where the director gave me a brief audition before the others arrived, mainly just to tell me which part I was going to sing. For those of you who know me pretty well, you know that I don't particularly like singing by myself in front of other people, so this experience was a bit nerve-wracking. Not to mention that it was conducted entirely in Spanish. It was a fairly simple process, the director told me to sing a song, any song, and he would determine where I should be placed. Unfortunately my nerves took control and I couldn't come up with anything, not even a Disney song. Between the two of us, we were able to find one and he told me I would be singing soprano. I knew this was a mixed group, of both age and experience, but I didn't realize how mixed it was until the other members arrived. The earliest arrivals were men and women who seemed to be about 70 years old. The two women that first approached me were beyond excited that there was a new person in the choir. When they found out that I was a foreigner, their excitement grew and they went to tell the others who I was. They began the rehearsal with sectionals. For those of you who don't know, this is when the choir separates into the individual voice parts and move to different rooms to practice. The soprano section had a difficult time paying attention because each time a new person entered the room where we were practicing, several of the women would attempt to introduce me at the same time. It was complete chaos. If you can imagine 12 small, grandmotherly-type women and a couple of 20-somethings who quite possibly had never met an American before, loudly talking about me and to me while another was constantly introducing me as "Rita, like Rita Hayworth", while the section leader was trying to keep us focused, that was the scene. All I know about Rita Hayworth is that she was famous for something, so I hope that was a complement. Basque people and choir people have a lot in common. From what I have seen so far, both are very welcoming and helpful, and they quickly adopt you into their family. I am very happy that this is the group that I decided to join.
Another, perhaps astonishing, accomplishment is that I managed to make it to the school where I will be teaching on the first try (after being shown once) without getting lost. I have now met all of the English teachers, as well as teachers from several other departments. The problem is that I have met so many people, almost all of whom have very Basque names, that I can't remember them. They have all been very instrumental in my attempting to accomplish all of the things I need to do. I now have a conversation partner, Idoia, who used to teach at my school and wanted to practice her English. In exchange, she is going to begin to teach me Basque. I have attempted to enroll in several Basque classes, but there is never enough people who have level zero to form a class, so this is a good alternative.
I did also manage to establish a bank account on my own. Idoia was going to help me, but we ran into a few problems. The first time we went to the bank, I had asked her if it were necessary to bring my passport for identification. She told me that just knowing my number would be sufficient. While this is true for Spanish nationals, it is not true for foreigners. Sadly, the account could not be opened that day. We agreed to meet on Thursday afternoon, because that was the only afternoon in which the bank was open, as the banks here are only open Monday - Friday until 2:00pm. Unfortunately for us, the bank had other plans. Despite the sign on the door saying that it was open, it was, in fact, closed. Knowing that I had to open the account as soon as possible, I decided to go yesterday morning on my own. Opening the account was easy, describing that I lived in "the other Washington" was not.
Other things I have managed to accomplish in the past couple of weeks include: making a grilled cheese sandwich that was neither burned nor undercooked, finding two grocery stores near my apartment and buying mandarin oranges, buying a cell phone, and taking a day trip to San Sebastián/Donostia.
Durango upside down
The view from Playa de la Concha, San Sebastián/Donostia at sunset
If you are reading this, you have probably been waiting in anticipation for my first post from Spain. Some of you may have expected me to post when I arrived nearly a week ago, but sketchy internet and a severe case of jet lag had me wait until now. Since you are anxious for some news, I will tell you what I have learned during my first week in the Basque Country.
Firstly, and probably most importantly, I have decided that I will never fly stand-by for a long-distance, international flight. The good part of this experience was that it was the reason behind many of the stories you are going to read, unfortunately, that is also the bad. I am going to start from where the story gets very interesting.
After sitting, and attempting to sleep, in several airports in several different countries, I was finally in Madrid. I was extremely exhausted, seeing as how I had been traveling and not sleeping for significantly more hours than I can count to in Basque, which added to the general stress of moving to a new country. Even considering my mental state at the time, I figured that I had been to Madrid enough times to get myself to the bus station and catch the bus to Bilbao so as to spend as little time there as possible. If you have ever heard me talk about my previous experiences in Madrid, you know that there is always some kind of fiasco and that I have a great dislike for the city. This visit was no exception. I decided to spend the money on a taxi to the bus station in order to avoid having to take the metro (subway) with all of my luggage by myself. Getting to the bus station was no problem. Unfortunately, it was the wrong bus station. Who would have thought that the buses to Bilbao didn't leave from the main station like the buses to many other major cities? The lady at the ticket counter told me to take the metro seven stops to one of the other bus stations in the city. After trying so hard to avoid the metro, I was not at all pleased, and I had only one hour to catch the bus. Being as tired as I was, it didn't even occur to me to take another taxi. I headed towards the metro, and ended up taking the wrong elevator so I still had to take an escalator down to the metro level. Normally this would be no problem, but I was carrying four suitcases which totaled approximately 130 pounds and wearing a sweater and nice pants, which leads me to another thing I learned. I will never travel wearing nice cloths again.
It terms of getting you places in a relatively timely fashion, the Madrid metro is an excellent mode of public transportation. Unfortunately, it is a rather old system with sporadic elevators and few escalators. It was about 75 degrees and very humid that day and I had to navigate these stations by myself with all 130 pounds of luggage. I caught the train, waited the seven stops, and managed to escape without losing anything. The only obstacle left between me and and the bus station was the escalator going up. Just as I arrived at the escalator another train let off the majority of its passengers who all needed to go up as well. I decided to wait for them to pass so that I wouldn't completely obscure the pathway. One woman noticed me standing there and stopped to ask if I needed help, and being so tired I could hardly put together a coherent sentence, I gladly took her up on her offer. She got me to the top of the escalator and I made it to the bus stop completely soaked with sweat.
I made it safely to Bilbao and was so tired that all I wanted to do was sleep, but I was so overly tired that I couldn't fall asleep and decided to start looking for apartments. I found one that seemed like a good fit in Durango, the city right across the river from where I will be teaching. I emailed them and they agreed to show me the apartment. I liked the apartment, and the people seemed nice, so I decided that it would be a good place to live. This was on Friday. Because I had paid the hostel until Monday, I decided to stay there and explore Bilbao a little. I didn't end up doing much exploring because I was still recovering from the trip. It poured both Thursday and Friday, which also didn't give me much incentive to wander around. Not wanting to face the local transportation system with all of my luggage at once, I made two trips from Bilbao to Durango, one on Saturday and the other on Sunday.
The third thing I learned was that I need to be more observant. I found out today that there is no oven in the apartment. To me, ovens and stoves generally go together, so I figured that when I saw the oven, there was a stove as well. It is fairly common here that apartments don't have ovens, but it is something I had taken for granted. Other than that, I am loving it here. The city is beautiful and full of things to do, if you know where to look
