Wheee another week. Hmm let's see... the boring part of the week included yet ANOTHER day off. :D Since all my kids were taking tests Wednesday I just...didn't go. I meant to, I really did. But 6 AM Janet did not consider this move logical or beneficial.
Thursday involved going to the 'brary and attempting to get Como agua para chocolate (Like Water for Chocolate), but I'd after I'd walked 45 minutes to get there, they decided to close up shop early...JUST as I was walking up to the circulation desk with my hard-earned find in hand (they don't use the Dewey decimal system here). Neither my pitiful pleas nor my snark did any good in convincing them to crank the computers back up, so I gave up and went back the next morning. The book is really good though, pretty easy to read in Spanish, and surely just as fun in English. I highly recommend.
Friday I went to a mall in this part of the city I'd never really been to and was there for hours upon hours. I finally came home with a cardigan (called "rebecas" here...I have no idea why...also PUM your Spain word for the post), earrings, a shirt and...drumroll...a big poofy winter coat! And it's super cute, in my humble opinion, and was pretty cheap. Wins all around! Now I just need boots...bahhhh last time was a huge fail...I'm way too picky.
Saturday was pretty chill but I went for tapas (how very Spanish, no?) with Chani's friend's roommate..hehe how's that for a connection? It was then that I realized that I'm still just as clueless when I look at menus as I was that very first day I ate out and ended up being like "bring me something yummy." I need to just sit down one day and learn what all the foods are. Also I am dying for a taco al pastor at this point. Just throwing that out there.
Anddd today was amazing. I woke up early and trekked across town (via metro and bus) to try out a church. It was kind of Midtown-esque, in theory, but way smaller. Like one little room small. Afterwards the lady sitting next to me just introduced herself out of nowhere and also invited me to the Sevillanas classes she teaches on Wednesdays (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sevillanas). I will not be going, as I have three left feet, but it was a nice invite. Then the pastor's (or whatever they're called) wife introduced herself and sort of pushed me over to a group of 2 American girls, a Finnish girl, and her daughter, who were all super friendly. The American girls are here doing the same thing as me and we talked for a bit on the way to the bus stop. Whee!
I successfully navigated my way back home, which is a big feat for me, since 98% of the time I freak out and think I've passed my stop and get off and then it turns out that in reality I'm at least a few stops too early and have to walk a bunch. Anyways, on the way home, I popped in a florist's because, well, why not? So now I have a...crap, I don't know what this plant is called. I have a lovely plant, which I am considering to be an essential component of my grownup apartment/life.
Also during the walking stretch of this morning's trip, it started to rain, which is really pretty unusual in Andalucia. I think it's rained like twice in the month and a half I've been here. But today there was a nice light rain that was perfect for getting back in my jammies and making coffee and getting in bed and borrowing Jorge's external hard drive and watching The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (and consequently crying for an hour) and then Invictus...so that is exactly what I did.
RANDOM GDL/SEVILLA COMPARISON TIME
Ok so my mentioning the bus ride reminded me of this: buses are WAY different here than in Guadalajara. The good thing about Sevilla buses is that they're really new and nice and neat and clean and have little "please stop" buttons in front of every seat (Oh no! My tangents now have tangents! "Please stop" reminded me of this: http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/02/please-stop.html) .
Sometimes there are little TVs that alternate between things like weather, news, trivia, mini English lessons, the map of the route you're on, etc. This month there are even Antonio Machado poems stickered onto the doors. How very cultured, Sevilla.
But this is the issue (which will probably only make sense and/or be amusing if you've been on GDL buses): in GDL everyone gets and/or crams onto the bus and is shut inside it as fast as possible to get on the road already. Then people fish out their pesos and work out the money part while the driver moves on. All about efficiency, man.
Here, the bus stays completely stopped while people get on, one by one, swipe their card, and take a seat. The bus doesn't move till everyone is on and paid for. And if you're fishing out your little prepaid card, called a bonobus (but pronounced bo-no boo) the driver will sit there, stopped, doors opened, and wait till you find it. Like they don't trust you or something and might have to make you get back off if it turns out your card is not, in fact, in the depths of your purse. Also when I'm towards the end of the line to get on I feel antsy, like people need to move faster because the doors are gonna get shut and the driver's gonna drive off without me. But that would never happen.
ALSO the stops here are set in stone. In GDL it's more of a guessing game, and sometimes the driver just randomly doesn't stop if he wants to like, get home faster or something, but on the plus side of this, if you smile and ask sweetly enough, they'll generally let you off at a place that's not actually a stop. So maybe that's not exactly fair, but I file that under efficient (for me..heh).
And Sevilla is such a small city that I suspect that walking would often be a quicker option than the whole bus ordeal. Or...maybe one of these days my bike card will come....
ALSO the stops here are set in stone. In GDL it's more of a guessing game, and sometimes the driver just randomly doesn't stop if he wants to like, get home faster or something, but on the plus side of this, if you smile and ask sweetly enough, they'll generally let you off at a place that's not actually a stop. So maybe that's not exactly fair, but I file that under efficient (for me..heh).
And Sevilla is such a small city that I suspect that walking would often be a quicker option than the whole bus ordeal. Or...maybe one of these days my bike card will come....
Anyways, that is the end of that comparison. I could analyze what this means about each culture, but I'm not going to.
But I will give you these random pictures from around Sevilla:
This graffiti's from right by my apartment. It says something like, "Yesterday was a very curious day. Love without fear is a very brave attitude."
This street is called Venta de Los Gatos, which I'm pretty sure means "Cat Sale."
And this one just made me lol:
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