Mi madre española

Today, there was a Sevilla fútbol game that my roommate, Kim, and several of my friends went to. I was planning on going, but I decided against it because I have my first two finals of the week tomorrow. Since my roommate was out at the game, my host mom, Julia, made some of my favorite foods for dinner-a tomato and tuna salad, pizza, yogurt, chocolate, and green tea! She felt bad that I had to miss the game to study (she's a huge Sevilla fan herself), so she made a special dinner just for me. I am so lucky to have been placed with such a great host mom!

Thoughts of the Day

One of the things I love most about Spain and the people, is that they never want to talk about themselves. It's one of the things that really differs from American culture, where I feel as though people are always talking about themselves. In America, people are always getting to know each other with "tell me about yourself." In Spain, they never really ask you personal questions-about your family, your history, your job, for example-at the start of a conversation. It's as if they bond with people solely based on personality and all the other details come later. This is one of the things I wish I could bring back to the states with me. I've been reflecting a lot about the things I will and will not miss about Spain since I will be home in just six days. 

I'll be posting soon about my trip to Italy and Greece with my sister, Erin, and Féria de Abril. I'm a little behind...finals week.

See you soon, America!

Semana Santa

Semana Santa, or Holy Week, is the most important religious event in Spain and Sevilla holds the largest celebration. All the events lead up to Easter Sunday. 

This week includes the processions of pasos, floats of lifelike sculptures of the different parts of the Passion. All the pasos, or floats, are handmade by artists. The different processions are organized by hermandades and cofradías, or religious brotherhoods. Brothers precede the pasos in the processions, along with musicians, generally brass bands. 

The processions follow designated routes around the city from their home churches to the Cathedral and back to their church. Sometimes, this can take all day.

The pasos are carried by a team of men called costaleros. They are named for the headress they wear to protect their heads. These men carry the paso on their necks and shoulders for hours, which can weigh over a ton. They are underneath the paso covered by a curtain, so it looks as if the float moves on its own. It takes about 24 to 54 costaleros to move a paso, who all have to walk in unison.

The brothers, or nazarenos, wear penitential robes and hoods that eerily resemble the outfits of the KKK. As my host Mom said, Spain had them first. No negative connotation here, but it's still slightly frightening to see them walk up behind you. There are different nazarenos for each brotherhood and use different colors for their robes and hoods. The purpose of the nazareno is to be able to perform penance without revealing their identity. Some nazarenos carry crosses, candles and some even walk barefoot, depending on the penance they are serving. The barefoot nazerenos really amazed me because it was over 85 degrees the day I went out to watch the processions and they are walking for hours, sometimes all day, on the hot concrete and stone.

The Spanish children bring balls of aluminum foil to the processions and hold them out to the nazarenos. The nazarenos drip the wax from their candles onto the foil ball and the children to get the biggest wax ball. Just a way to make watching the somber processions fun for the children.

brass band

Nazarenos

Paso

Overall, Semana Santa was great to see! My host mom and the majority of other Spaniards are really passionate about it. The crowds did get crazy and a few times it took a few hours to find my way out and get home. It's a huge part of Spanish, especially Sevillan, culture and it was great to experience it!

Morocco (Sahara)

On Sunday morning, we had our last breakfast in the hotel in Fes and set out in the bus again. We traveled for a few hours and stopped for lunch at an oasis. We had to walk through the "woods" for a little while then we arrived at a house turned restaurant. It was beautiful! And our last real toilet for a few days..

Walking to the oasis/restaurant for lunch

Our next stop on our journey to the Sahara was this beautiful lookout! You could see right down to the green trees of the oasis where we had stopped for lunch.

Finally, we got to get off the bus and switch to jeeps! This was by far my favorite part of the trip. The drivers were pretty crazy, but so nice. We spoke mostly Spanish to our driver because he knew little English. We flew over the dunes, raced the other jeeps and blasted Moroccan music along the way. It was so much fun! 

Halfway through our hour-long jeep ride to our camp, we stopped to watch the sunset and take some pictures.

When we got to the camp, we ran off to claim our beds for the next few nights and had dinner.

The tents we slept in were all connected in a square.

The big tent where we had our meals, listened to music and just relaxed.

This is our section of the tent!

Our bathrooms are the little things you see behind the tents. Our directors warned us that the toilets would be un-usable after about a day. They were real toilets, but just went into a hole in the ground. Our director, MJ, literally made it sound like the bathrooms would blow away as soon as we got there. Fortunately, they did not! Not the most glamorous, but better than the dunes.

Here's what the inside looked like. It was pretty comfortable besides the sand that rained on your face at night and a minor beetle infestation.

The next morning we set out on our camel ride! 

Here's my camel. I didn't like him enough to name him..

We rode the camels all the way to the great dune, a huge dune that we climbed to see a beautiful view of the Sahara. It was probably one of the hardest things I've ever done. You're slipping the whole way up the steep dune because of the sand. I took about 5 breaks on the way up, but I finally made it! What a workout! But the view was amazing and running back down was worth the hike.

Our camels looking like ants from the top of the great dune.

So, we left the great dune and had to get back on the camel to ride to a nearby village. In reality, I hated riding the camel. I'm afraid of heights and it's uncomfortable and rocky and the camels sometimes lose their footing going over the dunes. Also, they're not very friendly animals. It was just me though-everyone else loved riding them! I tried to suck it up and get back on to ride back, but a few minutes in, I asked the Moroccan man leading our camels (they're all tied together in a line) if I could get off. Unfortunately, he had to stop everyone and untie my camel and let me off. It was pretty dramatic. At least I can say I did it! I had more fun walking back alongside everyone on their camels and talking to the Moroccans. One of the boys taught me how to tie a turban the right way.

After we got off the camels, we went to a house/restaurant for drinks, or so they told us. There was a pool and our directors failed to mention it! We were so hot from being out all day, we jumped right in the pool with some or all of our clothes on! I can't even describe how amazing that pool felt. Also, it constituted our only semi-shower for a few days.

After our swim, we went to a store across the street that sold mostly rugs. We had mint tea and the owner put on a little show for us.

We were tired after a long day in the sun!

When we got back to the camp, we had a few hours to kill before dinner, so some played soccer with the kids from around our camp. My friend, Taylor, snapped a few greats pictures of the kids! All the little girls saw that I had my toenails painted red and kept asking if I had any nail polish to paint theirs. I wish I did, but it wasn't something I thought to bring! They were all so cute and friendly.

A bunch of us got henna done on our hands from a few women and girls who came to our camp to do it. I went to a little girl who was maybe 12 and she wrote my name in Arabic on my hand!

After our few great days in the desert, we got to ride a jeep back to our bus again-my favorite! Our driver this time was even more animated than the first. He loved Shakira more than anyone I've ever met, so we blasted Shakira and danced the whole ride back. His name was Barack ("Barack not Obama" or so he said) and he wrote down all our names to add us on Facebook. I'm a little upset because he has yet to add me!

Later that day, we stopped in a forested area to try to see monkeys! 

My friend, Heather, got some great shots of the monkeys!

That night we arrived to our hotel in Marrakesh for our last evening in Morocco. My friend Lauren and I had been talking about how we wanted to go in the pool all day. We got there and it was absolutely freezing, but we went in anyway. All the hotel workers thought we were crazy.

Overall, such an amazing, once-in-a-lifetime trip! It was great because our ISA directors have been there so many times that they knew people everywhere we went. I generally have an aversion to guided trips, but I think a guide for Morocco was definitely necessary. We experienced so much more of the culture because of all the contacts our directors have throughout the country. I really would love to go back someday. I'll just skip the camel ride next time...