MADRID MEGA POST

My internet was super shady at my grandpa's apartment in Madrid, although not as shady as the internet cafes within a 5 mile radius of him. Thos places felt like the would be hangouts of the unibomber or something. Point is, I had limited use of the internet and when I could connect I kept forgetting to update. So here is portions of what I remembered to write down on the word document not-cleverly titled "adventures in madrid."

09 de septiembre del 2009

The apartment is huge. The second we got here, my grandparents took me out for lunch to their favorite little restaurant around the corner. Let me tell you that when I opened the menu I felt like it was in another language. I didn't understand any of the descriptions. I finally saw something that said "fettuccini," so I quickly ordered that. 5 minutes later, I get a plate with pig fat pieces (the bacon), what I assume to be garlic (it only sort of tasted like garlic), and black spaghetti. I had never before seen black spaghetti. I hesitantly tasted it, and it tasted good enough for me to eat it all with some bread, save the bacon and garlic. At least the sauce was good. For dessert I had vanilla ice cream, which was a nice change from what I dubbed the black worms. Afterwards we went back home, slept, woke up, ate some sandwiches, watched a weird game show where the contestants opened doors and won money, then slept until the next day. While I was falling asleep, I turned on the TV and watched some show where there was a man dressed with a green dress, pink tights, and a wig doing experiments with electricity. Needless to say I had weird dreams last night.

Also, I forgot to mention the Madrid Airport. Very confusing. When you get off the plane and pass immigration, you have to take a train to baggage claim. Which I mean is fun in an I’ve-never-been-here-this-is-completely-different kind of way, but strange also because, why was the airport built like this? Although, we did seem to be underground, maybe under the runway. This was especially obvious when we were in the elevator and it indicated we were on the -1 Floor. We had to go to Floor 0 to leave. Or was it 3? All a blur, I was very tired. I did notice there were many defibrillators scattered about the airport, which I mean is great, but also seemed odd. Do we have those at MIA? I can’t say I’ve ever noticed them if we do.

This morning I woke up at 10, showered, and my grandpa and I went to the ministries to see what we had to do for me to get my DNI and residency. We got on the metro and went to the Puerta del Sol, which is next to the Plaza Mayor, which is where Phillip II used to live. All the buildings in the area are very old, and it's the whole business on the first floor and the rest are apartments format. I loved it. We went to two different ministries and four different offices and were told to come back tomorrow. Fun. To not waste the trip, my grandpa took me down Alcala, which is the longest street in Madrid. We saw el Banco de Espana, which is his favorite building because it has columns, and the fountain La Civele, among other things. A bus took us back to the apartment and we went back to the restaurant for lunch. This time I ordered chicken and was very happy.

There's an accordion player around the corner.

10 de septiembre del 2009

I’ve stumbled upon the Spanish version of Big Borther, Gran Hermano. Now I have never watched Big Brother, not because of anything except that I could never remember when it was, and when I did I usually had other things to do. That and I mean it’s not especially stimulating. Point is, as far as I understood, on Big Brother there were challenges and sex and stimulating things for the person who wanted to turn off their brain for a while and laugh at people’s stupidity/desperate desire for their 15 minutes. On Gran Hermano, all these people have done is sit around and talk about… I can’t even tell you because I can’t understand them. Between the accent that I’m still getting used to and the fact that they all talk at once, I feel like the challenge is for me instead of them. Now they’re talking about who they don’t like. This I understand perfectly. Miami has trained me well.

Today’s been an interesting day. My grandfather and I woke up at 7 and went to the Civil Registry to try and obtain my Venezuelan birth certificate that was registered in the Spanish Consulate in Caracas in order to get my DNI, which is the national ID in case I didn’t mention that before. We waited in line for an hour and a half, which actually went by pretty quickly because we made friends with the lady behind us. One of the guys on Gran Hermano has his shirt off, this is more like it. This other guy needs to put his back on. Who told him those tattoos were a good idea? So this lady was telling us about how she got to travel the world because her father was an Indian ambassador. She lived in Chile, Argentina, Spain, Cuba, Yemen, India obviously. You wouldn’t have even guessed any of this because her mother was Spanish and she didn’t seem to inherit many Indian qualities. At least none too obvious that my ignorant eye could pick up on. In the end, all I got was a stronger desire to visit Chile. She wasn’t too big a fan of Argentina, but this was years and years ago. Plus, regardless of how the country is, their accent is still beautiful and that’s all I need.

At 9 o’clock they gave us a number, 106, and then we waited some more. At 12:30 they finally called us in, and instead of giving us the birth certificate, which I would think they would be able to do since I was registered in November of 1989, which gives them 19 years to get everything in one place, the lady gave us a letter saying we can pick it up in late September. Looks like they actually do have to call Caracas and have them send it over. That was more or less today’s big adventure. In the afternoon, Marta, my step-grandma, took me to the Corte Ingles, which is the A-Rod of department stores (in terms of steroids). They have everything of everything, and there was a ton of people. We went to buy me an alarm clock and two tickets to the Cuban National Ballet’s performance of Swan Lake for next week. I’m actually really pumped for that. Tomorrow is filled with more errands, and it looks like I’m just going to have to make do with the couple of hours of internet that I get. I’ll have to talk to all my dear, dear friends that I miss dearly next week.

They’re still talking on Gran Hermano. There seem to be two houses, and these people in the other house are all dressed in black. One lady has a bat tattoo on her chest. She’s shaking her head as she holds a packet of Sweet ‘n Low.

13 de septiembre del 2009

How did I miss two days? What did I do in those two days?

Friday must not have been terribly exciting because I only remember going on errands with Marta in the afternoon. I did pass by this piano store that had a lot of things with sheet music printed on it, like the pair of gloves in the window. For whatever reason I didn’t go in and decided to come back the next day, but yesterday it was closed. I’ll try again tomorrow. I’m not used to stores closing on the weekends. OH. Wow how did I forget this? In the morning, Marta and my grandpa took me to El Palacio Real, which is this huge palace used solely to entertain guests apparently. It used to house Carlos II and some other people, I already forgot. It was so elaborate and some of the rooms so striking that after a while it lost its glamour. That is until I realized I was walking where kings and servants and nobles had walked 300 years ago. I started thinking about the pranks people must’ve pulled, or the secret romances between servants, and servants and nobles. How the children must’ve played hide and seek, or hidden from their tutors. I would’ve. And another thing, they only allow you to see a tiny portion of the castle, there’s a ton of rooms they have closed off. As I was leaving I decided that at some point in my life it’d be killer to be a tour guide. I love all that stuff.

Yesterday I was allowed out on my own. In the morning we went to have breakfast at a café in the Corte Ingles, but the croissant and cafe con leche that I had were terrible. Regardless, there was WiFi so I was able to check my email and see Juan Carlos’ mega post on facebook. I hate that I haven’t been able to properly talk with anyone. The hotel in London better have wireless. It should, right? I don’t even remember which one it is. After breakfast we made all the reservations for next week, and we booked my flight to Madrid for christmas. However, I realized last night that I should’ve gotten back to Kent on the 16th instead of the 17th, to give myself a day to get ready for the new term. Oh well, can’t fix it now. I don’t know what I’ll do for 4 weeks here though. Hopefully I can spend a couple of days in Barcelona and visit my godmother, and maybe I make friends that live near here and I can visit them? I’m going to go crazy. However I will definitely buy an internet connection.

Anyway, my afternoon out. I wanted to go to the piano store, so I walked down this street that I don’t know the name of looking for it, and decided to keep walking once I saw that it was closed. I ended up right where I wanted, at this huge park called El Retiro. Beautiful park. I started taking a bunch of pictures, and soon ran out of battery. That was a bummer. I had left the battery charging the night before but I must’ve done something wrong because it had a stick left. I still got some good pictures in though. To not waste the afternoon, I decided to just lay down under some trees and read The Alchemist, which I thought was very appropriate. I had only intended to read Part 1, but I read the whole book. Honestly I wasn’t sure why I was so captivated by the book in the first place. It’s a good book, with some great insight, but I wasn’t as blown away on second read, despite having forgotten everything. Still a good read though. As I was looking for a metro stop because I was tired as hell, I saw this beautiful church that some guy next to me started saying was a one of kind for Spain, that the only other one like that was in Italy. I have no idea as to the validity of this, but I still want to go back and take pictures.

That was my big day out. I might go out again today, maybe after lunch. I’m not really sure where to go though. Maybe I’ll go back to the palace to visit the huge church, and take some more pictures of the surrounding buildings. Or maybe I’ll go to Velazquez to the Plaza de Colon. Or maybe I’ll just go back to the park and finally finish reading Brave New World. Or I could go the park around the corner here. I think I’ll watch 17 Again first. I’m on a Zac Efron kick after watching HSM 2 yesterday. And no, I don’t think it’s a crime to stay in while in beautiful Madrid. Besides, I’ll be here an entire month in December. What did I get myself into? 6 days until move in. I can’t wait.

14 de septiembre del 2009

Today’s topic of conversation: whether or not I’m emotionally independent
Conclusion: obviously not


15 de septiembre del 2009

My grandfather has started quizzing me on all the advice he’s given me in the past week. This is a problem, as I only really listened to 37% of what he’s said.

I miss my Harry Potter books. I randomly thought of something and wanted to look up the exchange between Snape and the Marauder’s Map in book 3, then realized I couldn’t.

I’ve spent almost the entire day looking up ways to get from London to Canterbury and such. I know the way I search is not the most efficient, but this took longer than it should have. Yes, I did have MLIA open and I got to page 123, but I was not feeling well this morning. Don’t judge me.

I still don’t feel well, something’s not right. Thank you, immune system, for picking such a distinguished time to fail me.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer in Spanish! Suddenly I feel much better. I’ve missed this show. And a Pampers commercial with Gavin Degraw’s “Follow Through.” I’ll take this as a sign to keep my chin up.

16 de septiembre del 2009

We leave for the airport in a few minutes, just wanted to update, the ballet (Swan Lake) was beautiful. I was confused most of the time, however. At first it was because we arrive 15 minutes late (surprisingly not my fault). Then I just didn't understand certain dances, probably because I was exhausted, but thankfully the little pamphlet explained it. In the end, I'd definitely recommend it to someone who enjoys watching ballets. The jester during the royal scenes was hilarious, he distracted me whenever he was onstage. And the Prince danced beautifully, as did Odette, the swan. I wish I was rhythmically inclined.

The most interesting part of the night, though, was the metro ride there. Near me was the most androgynous person I've ever seen. I made it my mission to determine its sex, so I started looking at obvious points.
1. really tight pants. Negated, look at scene boys.
2. no boobs. Negated, look at Grace Adler
3. short hair, pierced ears. Again, could go either way
Finally, the universe gives me a hint. The person was wearing a buttoned up shirt that was button low, and when he/she moved, a bra was revealed. I got very excited until I realized that, too, meant nothing. Look at J. Edgar Hoover. I never did figure it out. I'd make a lousy detective. The two guys next to me were discussing their gayness (no, really), and one talked about how he was bisexual and he and his friends would have enormous parties that lasted all night (which I took to mean orgies). About 3 minutes later I realized he was sort of checking me out. At first I was turned off because he wasn't particularly attractive, but then I realized that the most beautiful men I've seen are usually gay, and chances are he knows at least one beautiful gay man, which means I have a chance at an orgy with the man of my dreams (in a physical sense). That was pretty much it. My trip was not that interesting, but still fun.