#highlowglitter

Molli visited El Prado while I wandered the barrio de letras, then we met up for Ricci ice cream, followed by beer for the Vienna vs Iceland game which left Vienna out of the competition, then porras with hot chocolate at San Ginés. Basically I didn't eat any real food after breakfast, but it's vacation, so it doesn’t count, right? I'm pretending to be like the Viennese, who Molli assures me say that one bad health choice must be followed by a good one to balance it out. To that end, Molli and I walked for an hour or so in Retiro park as the heat became a pleasant nighttime breeze around the pond and through the outdoor photography exhibit on Syrian refugees before heading to bed.

High: My friends are just good people. We cover all manner of conversation from the mundane to the philosophical, from sports to food, from memories to aspirations. 

Low: The world is intense and sad. We were reading about the teacher protests in Oaxaca that have been going in now for four years, but have been a problem since 2006. Also the House sit-in for gun control reforms is happening.

Glitter: Ricotta and fig gelato is surprisingly tasty, and we got tix for the ballet on Friday.

June 21

In the morning we spent a few hours at the San Telmo museum in their permanent exhibit on basque history, the path to modernity, the cathedral wing, and the temporary exhibit on peace. The peace exhibit had a whole lot of conflict and death for being focused on peace. I got caught up in the exhibits to the point where Molli had to come looking for me, though honestly I only really remember a couple of things - the Roma were probably originally from around India and were also persecuted during WWII even though it's not recognized, and the white flag is supposed to be reminiscent of a dove like the one God sent to Noah. We did a whirlwind tour around the underground market and picked up some cheese and lunch stuff, made delicious vegetable-y sandwich lunch, then hopped on the bus for eight hours back to Madrid.

High: The handmade birthday present from Anna. I don't think I can properly express how much this relationship means to me. She is someone I could come to with any thought and get a thoughtful response, or any problem and get an empathetic solution. She was there at one of the most pivotal changes in my life as I was creating my new identity as a Spanish speaker, a traveler, a girlfriend, and so many other things. She's always real and just as confused and falsely sure about life as I am, which means we make up advice like we make up history, and just say it with confidence like it's the real deal. 

Low: I'm getting blisters. These shoes are not good.

June 20

We spent the morning hiking to San Pedro from San Sebastián on the coastal cliffs. The views were incredible and the two and a half hours of hiking relatively easy as we talked about everything from friends getting married to kids to making calendars to nature. We decided not to take the little boat across to San Juan, though Carlos at the hostel assures us that the seafood at the restaurants there is fantastic. Decision making deteriorated rapidly as I got hungry, but luckily Anna kept her head and with some bread, cheese, peppers and pasta in us, everything got much better. Thank god Anna had the good sense to just take charge, because I was about at zero. Another few hours on the beach had me feeling a little crispy, and another gelato, this time coffee and brownie, had me sugar-happy. We grabbed a pintxo dinner at Gorriti with delicious shrimp skewers, peppers, a cod-stuffed pepper, morcilla, and a couple other things I can't remember. Molli got this tasty almost sparkly wine called Txakoli, which, as well as the cider, is definitely worth a try. We spent a good long while there slowly ordering more and more pintxos until we were full, then wandered out to the coastal road to catch the end of the sunset before dark. 

Anna and I spent another hour or so walking up and down the beach at midnight with the very low tide, as if the beach had doubled while we were eating. We talked about relationships and futures, getting finger gunned, professional progress and emotional stability. I feel emotionally stable, but I'm worried I'm not doing what I should be, or not making the decisions or taking the risks to become an “adult.” I know I applied again for Peace Corps because it feels safe, but I am equally worried that if I apply for grad school I will end up paying a huge amount that I will regret having to pay back. I know I should get a grad degree soon, but does it need to be now? Will I feel ready for it by January? Should I apply for Bradford and MIIS and Denver? Should I get a degree with letters rather than a development MA? If I'm happy and young and without obligations, am I where I should be? Am I doing Peace Corps because I don’t want to deal with an office job and trying to move my way up in an organization? I can’t even imagine being back in the U.S. right now, much less forcing myself into some position just for the paycheck and the work experience. I have so many doubts about where I am now and where I should be. 

We talked about our friends and classmates back in the States. It's hard sometimes to talk to old friends, especially since these past couple of years have turned us into different people. It's hard to connect with the down-to-the-minute scheduling of life in the US and constant emphasis on advantage and future advantage. No, I'm not in a job that pays me, and that's ok with me. We talked about how Anna’s mom and her best friend didn't really talk for five years because they weren't in the mental space to be able to hear each other, and how that white noise is coming between relationships with friends at home. It’s hard to be on the same page with someone who’s getting married, thinking about kids, coming up on five years and a promotion while I’m flitting from country to country. I’m definitely finding things I’m passionate about, but that hasn’t sated the wanderlust in the least. If anything it makes me want to see more and try more jobs with more organizations. 

Anna also said something to the effect that you will find people to love by doing the things you love. I know I find great friends that way - Anna is a case in point - but I wonder if I'm intentionally closing myself off to the possibility of a relationship because I know I will be moving on. That's a silly thing to do. I justified it in El Sal as not jeopardizing my respect in the community, and in Georgia I say I don't want to get involved with the religion or intense families. I know there are crazy families and progressive families everywhere, but at some point I just don't want to get involved. And I'm lazy - I have no interest in going through the steps of flirting and uncertainty and caring about how I look and not knowing what's ok and what's weird. That's exhausting. I do want to be in a relationship, though, and definitely want to get married and have kids at some point. Life is confusing. Being an adult is confusing. Am I even doing it?

High: Midnight on the beach.

Low: The hour after hiking before lunch. I cannot function and definitely cannot make decisions without food.

June 19

We arrived in San Sebastián in the morning and met up with Molli to drop our stuff at the hostel and eat a delicious reja pastry with dried fruit inside and chocolate-dipped ends. Anna's friend Jon gave us a mini tour around San Sebastián, pointing out the most expensive stretch and taking us up to the palace. There used to be rails all the way to the sea, so that the queen could go down the rails in a boat without ever touching the beach and mingling with the peasants. Rather than get caught in the parents' march against some new industrial plant or something that's being built, we walked back along the beach to town and got local lunch of fried squid sandwiches with mayo and spicy sauce to eat at the port. We passed a group of adults doing the Spanish equivalent of line dancing in the park in a huge circle, chilled on the beach for the afternoon, got ice cream at Boulevard, and found a pintxo place for dinner. The water is super cold, but on such a hot day once I got over the shock of it, it felt good to cool off. In the evening before dinner we decided to hike up to the fortress and Jesus statue at the top of the hill, then came partway down before stopping to watch the sunset over the ocean before we ducked into the pintxo place for tasting all sorts of good food and drink.

High: Sunset on Monte Urgull talking about Viennese dancing, teaching, third year in TFA or Peace Corps, and dengue, among other things  

June 18

Anna and I spent the morning touring the Burgos museum for hours with the audio guide. It feels as large as a small city inside, and the art and architecture, especially the half dome ceilings, is impressive. In one corner is a clock with a papamoscas that opens and closes its mouth with each quarter hour, looking like it’s eating flies. I feel like it was the gleeful request of some priest who dearly wanted to terrify the children. There are mythical creatures painted and carved into many of the pieces, which I love, and there was a part with all of these miniature towers and extremely intricate carvings that made me think of Galadriel’s Mirkwood or the miniatures of Sauron’s tower. We somehow got lucky and still didn’t get rained on as we made our way back to the the hotel and caught the bus to Bilbao. I liked the hostel - Akellare - and we dropped our stuff so we could wander around for the afternoon. Evidently we should have made it into old town because there were parties and plays all throughout because we got there for Bilbao’s birthday. Instead, after grabbing some pastries (pan con mantequilla is literally buttered sugar bread - don’t be fooled) we went up the ascensor to see views of the city. Bilbao isn’t really my favorite place - I prefer what I’ve seen of Madrid - but we had a good time walking around looking out over the city. The hermitage was absolutely not worth it. It’s just a little white cabin with nothing else that was clearly recently rebuilt. After dinner and a quick nap we headed back for noche blanca at the Guggenheim in the drizzling rain. They were projecting art onto one of the other museum’s walls on the way there, but we hurried on and got in for free with some pretty big crowds, but nothing like what they were when we left. They had some interesting interactive tech art on the ground floor, one of which was this scrolling series of poetry that illuminated the space behind it, where you could stand, in all blue. One side was in Spanish, and the other in Basque. Modern art is not my thing. The one part I really enjoyed was a massive metal installation by Richard Serra of various shapes that you could walk through and be engulfed by. I also quite liked a lot of the cubism paintings, but otherwise I could have happily stayed unenlightened as to the “wonders” of modern art. There was a series of scribble paintings that were “Nine Discourses on Commodus,” but felt like ten-minute messes, and a whole gigantic series by Louise Bourgeois that was creepy and strange and how is it art?? She made all of these “rooms” with different things in them - one looked like a lab with all of these red wax hands and arms and organs and tools, one was just a cage with a shit ton of chairs scrambled inside, etc etc. Here’s the link so you can judge for yourself. She also made the spider that’s outside the museum. I cannot fathom the appeal. We stopped in the Warhol room, and it literally was an abstract shadow print with different colored backgrounds side by side across all the walls in the entire room. I feel like I should be nodding wisely and commenting on the darkness of the human soul, but I just don’t get it. I like whimsy and color and even commentary, but I gravitate more towards the things that don’t need a special pass to see it. The three-story dog made out of flowers outside of the museum was great, though, and Anna and I both wrote and hung wishes for the wishing tree. We escaped the museum around midnight, took a quick tour through the end of the tents set up with endless food for the festival, then called it a night.

High: Burgos cathedral, especially the werewolves, griffons, dragons and lions.

Low: Modern art is baffling. 

June 17

We spent the morning at Anna's school with her students on their last day. Every time I visit one of her classrooms, I am more secure in my decision to never become a teacher. I'm glad she does it, but it is not the career for me.

In the afternoon we hopped on a bus to Burgos where we're staying the night in a fancy room (thanks parents!) that smells like bath oil beads. We got here in the rain, but by the time we left the hotel again it cleared up and we had a few hours to wander the streets, up to the castle, and around the gorgeous gothic cathedral catching up and recounting relationship woes. Some of the ruins have giant storks' nests on top, which is super cool. We stopped in for dinner at Cerveceria Morito, where we got morcilla, pulpo frito and pork medallions with bread with goat cheese and raspberry sauce, all of which I would definitely recommend. The place was packed but we lucked out grabbing the last stools, and the food took maybe fifteen minutes total from the time we ordered to the time we started eating, which is completely baffling to me in a place that had so many people packed inside and so many staff just shouting orders back and forth. We walked off the food wandering along the river and through the park, then made it back with only a few wrong turns to the hotel where we listened to the excellent Cheerleader remix and I introduced Anna to the first few songs on the Hamilton soundtrack (because the obsession must be spread as far as possible).

High: It's still just spending time with Anna. A lot has happened in the years since we've seen each other, and we both have a lot of doubts and hopes and stories, though I feel like I contribute much less to the catastrophe conversation, except in the terrible diseases category.

Low: I spent the first four hours of the day feeling intensely ill. I don't know if it was the sangria or the traveling or a combination of the two, but my body wanted nothing to do with it.

June 16 

The flights from Tbilisi to Istanbul to Madrid were easy and I was asleep before we even took off. I was a little embarrassed deplaning in Istanbul because I woke up when we landed, but then fell asleep again as everyone was getting off so the stewardess had to wake me up again and the bus had to wait for me while everyone else was already on. I made it without incident to the cafe, navigating the Madrid metro fairly well, and finally met up with Anna again after years apart. It's like no time has passed and we can just pick up where we left off, as if we were just meeting up in the square between our two houses in Valpo like we did most days during our study abroad six years ago. Six years! We were both such different people when we arrived in Chile, and so young. For my first afternoon in Madrid we wandered Retiro park, I met some of Anna's friends, Fernie made us fajitas and guac, we decorated carrot cake cupcakes for Allie's birthday, and drank a lot of sangria before I fell into an exhausted sleep at an early 1 am.

High: Just being around Anna again and getting to talk again is wonderful. She was my best friend in Chile, and continues to be a person who constantly inspires me, makes me cringe-laugh, and challenges my worldview.

Low: That constant nagging stomachache and tiredness that always accompanies my first day of travel.

It’s the day before vacation, and I spent a really productive day at work with Tiko planning out our social enterprise and pollination project and Future Problem Solving. We have such a short time left, and so many things to fill it with!

High: Setting dates for our projects, in the hopes that everything will be organized and functional by September. FPS may well become a reality.

Low: Pollination project is still on the drawing board and will have to wait until vacation is over.