Monday, March 29, 2010
My Papa's 80th Birthday
The party was a typical family gathering - really loud, everyone catching up on everyone else's lives, seating according to age (fortunately, there were 8 other people between the ages of 16 and 30, so I had lots of company), children being embarrassed by their parents, etc. It felt like a cross between Thanksgiving dinner, Sunday dinner at the lake, and a wedding reception. It was really fun to be able to be part of it, but it also made me miss home a lot! I love you and miss you guys a lot!
For the next two weeks, I will be traveling in Norway and Italy, so my next post will be some time after April 11. Hasta luego!
Monday, March 22, 2010
Las Fallas - La Crema = The Burning
We saw the giant statue of the Virgin Mary which they decorate with flowers that each woman and girl brings to the Virgin during a giant parade in her honor. They had a smaller version in Denia with a parade on Friday which we also saw.
We also saw a mascelta, which is a fireworks/firecrackers show, except that in Spain, they focus way more on the noise than on the lights. It actually happened in the middle of the afternoon in the plaza in front of the city hall. At the beginning, it was just like being really close to a normal fireworks show, but at the end, the ground was shaking and the whole crowd was yelling. They used really big explosions that have a deeper sound than the sharp cracks that hurt your ears, so it was not painful at all, it just made your entire body shake. It was a huge adrenaline rush!
During the afternoon, we went to see a bullfight. It was fascinating, but it was also really bloody. The stadium was completely sold out and the crowd participated a lot in the fight. There were six bulls and three matadors, each of whom fought two bulls. Before anything started, there was an opening ceremony where the picadors, bandilleros, and matadors were presented to the crowd. There really is a lot of artistry and ceremony involved in a fight, and I can understand why Spaniards defend it as a cultural expression of the contest between man and nature. When a really strong, angry bull is charging at a man with nothing but a cape and a sword, there is terrible beauty in that. The sad part is when the bull is weaker and stumbles or when the matador is not very good and has does not kill the bull on the first try. Then you just feel like the bull is put in the ring for sport and does not stand a chance anyway. The picadors are the hardest to watch for me because the bull butts up against the horse with a lot of force. The horse is protected by a really thick padding, but there were a few times when the horse almost fell because the bull was pushing on it so hard. I actually think that the bandilleros are the most fascinating to watch because they do not have a cape which means that when they run at the bull to stick it with their spears, they are completely exposed. The matadors were interesting, but they were not very good.
Alright, they are closing school, so one picture of them burning the Falla in the last post, and then I'm off. I think that the most powerful thing about watching these was the heat. Standing in the front row usually meant that you had to back away from it about a minute after it caught fire.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Pictures of Fallas
Monday, March 15, 2010
Las Fallas
This past weekend, the festival of Las Fallas started in Denia. It is a festival dedicated to Saint Joseph, the carpenter. Traditionally, all the carpenters would clean out their shops, use the extra wood to make statues, and then burn on them on Saint Joseph’s Day. The burning signifies purging the people of their failures (fallas), from which the festival gets its name. Today, Las Fallas is a huge contest between the neighborhoods of Denia to construct the biggest and best statue (which today are made out of sculpted flammable foam over wood frames). Various intersections throughout the city have been shut down, and the different neighborhoods are starting to put together the statues.
Las Fallas is also an excuse for the entire city to be a fiesta: in a party, which means that almost 24 hours a day, you can hear firecrackers in various plazas of the city. Two nights ago, at 23:45 (11:45pm if you dislike military time), I was talking on the phone, leaning out my window, and looking out at the street when this group of young teenage boys (12-14ish?) came running down the street with a 2L pop bottle. I watched them curiously as they huddled over the bottle about fifty feet down the street. Suddenly, they all sprinted toward me, past me, and out into the plaza. I looked back at the bottle just in time to see it blow up in an explosion that was big enough to rattle the windows of the house across the street. It was sweet!
This coming Thursday, we are headed to Valencia (the capital of our region) to see the statues there. Las Fallas is a regional festival throughout the Valencian community, and the statues in the capital are the biggest. One neighborhood has spent 600.000 Euros = $800,000 constructing theirs! The day that we go, we are also going to see a bullfight and watch the fireworks which start at 1am!
In the mean time, we are in the middle of exams: literature today, history and art history tomorrow, and contemporary culture on Wednesday. Yeah for studying to the sound of firecrackers!
(apologies for the lack of pictures...I left my camera cord at my house...maybe tomorrow? - don't hold your breath)