Karen has been kidnapped by Gypsies and I haven't had access to internet.

One of those statements is true.

Anwyay, we arrived in florence a couple days ago and have been checking out the Duomo and the Galleries. We saw the David yesterday, and saw the Birth of Venus today. Even with my layman's eye, it's easy to see why these pieces are so celebrated.

I'm sorry I haven't been updating, but we really haven't had easy access to computers in the hostels we've stayed at here, so the photojournal is pretty much finished at this point. Apologies to whoever is disappointed by this. I'll just tell everyone about it when I get back, and post a link to the flickr account once I upload everything. Right now we're in an internet room to the SE of Florence, paying far too much per minute to use the Internet.

Anyway, chances are that the next time you hear from me, I'll be back in the states.

So, the hostel we're staying in doesn't allow you to upload pictures via USB (or use CDs, for that matter), so this entry will be short and without pictures. Alas! Should we find a phone / internet booth today, I'll try to get a few uploaded.

Anyway, Rome is an interesting city. The annoying thing about Rome is the horde of Indian and Bangladeshi street hawkers. So, Karen and I left the hotel yesterday after getting everything set up. Within three blocks, only three blocks of the hostel, we were accosted by four men trying to sell us umbrellas. After the fourth, I told Karen that I was tempted to just purchase an umbrella so that they stopped bothering us (not that this worked, mind you). In hindsight, that is likely their strategy.

So, we reached a plaza with a cathedral located nearby. Another street seller came up and asked if we wanted an umbrella. I caved, since I thought it might not be a bad idea to have an umbrella, and asked him how much. He told me five euros, I waved him away and said. No. He asked how much I would be willing to pay. I thought a moment, and said two euros. He got this sorry expression on his face, and said "I cannot sell it for that much". He suggested four. So, I suggested three. He said no again, so I shrugged and walked away. Honestly, I didn't really care. So, he followed us across the plaza, yelling "Friend! Friend!". Finally, we stopped, and he sold the umbrella to me for three euro.

When we were inside the church listening to the Easter service, I began to have misgivings. I mean, if he was willing to sell it for that much, i could've gotten a better deal. However, by the time we left, it was pouring. So, my regret faded away, as we definitely needed an umbrella for the rest of the day.

We had lunch at some italian place, then headed back to the hostel so Karen could get into some dry clothes (the umbrella kept her shirt dry, but not her skirt). We then walked down to the Colosseum and the old Forum. We were advised by a man at the hostel that you can get a combined ticket for both at the Forum, and skip the huge line at the Colosseum. It was kinda late in the day, though, so we only had time for the Forum. Hopefully I can post some pics of that... Anyway, we got drenched -again-. No umbrella could've prevented that, with the amount of rain falling.

We went back to the hostel and Karen napped for a bit (and changed into her last dry pair of pants). When she woke up, we went out to dinner (i'll describe this later, in a post with pictures). After that, we headed out to the trevi fountains. And were accosted by -more- street sellers. This time they walked up to Karen with Roses saying "Here! A gift for you! Not selling, it is a gift!". We both kept saying "no", but the man refused to leave until about the seventh "no". The next guy who came (a minute later) left a bit quicker, but I probably sounded a bit more annoyed at the start.

Anyway, so that's how things are at the moment. Today we're going back to the Colosseum, and then wherever.

Cordoba and the Mezquita

So, we went to Cordoba yesterday. Since Cordoba is an hour or so away by AVE trains, and we wanted to spend as many hours there as we could to justify a day trip, we caught a bus out of Velez at 7 AM. This got us to Malaga in time to catch our train to Cordoba. So... after waking up at 6, we finally reached Cordoba a little before 10.

While our primary goal was the Mezquita, since we were there so early, we ended up just wandering around. As we weren´t worried about time, I wasn´t particularly concerned with following the map. So, I ended up leading us, well, erm... off the map. Anyway, we came across some firemen on strike, and a park full of white pigeons.

Eventually, once Karen started becoming apprehensive (and needing a bathroom break), I made a (successful!) effort to get us back to the map, and to the Mezquita. She remained doubtful until we saw a sign along the path I chose that said "Mezquita" with an arrow pointing down the road. *sigh*



Anyway, this is the Mezquite. The site the Mezquite is built on was originally the site of a Visigoth cathedral which was destroyed by the Muslims to built their mosque (a HISTORICAL FACT, as my guide pamphlet prominently states). Inside the Mezquite, there is an excavation several meters into the ground that shows tiles from the original church. This occurred around 780 AD. Later on, when Cordoba fell (1236 AD), the Christians reworked the whole thing and filled it with Christian icons. So, the Mezquite is filled with Islamic architecture that frames statues of Christian saints, Mary, and Jesus.

The arches above were made by combining brick and mortar.



Stained glass window. The cielings are extremely high.




I´m not sure who exactly that is, but the detail on the walls behind him is amazing.



Another picture of the maze of columns.

After we left the Mezquite, we had lunch and went to an arabic teahouse.



The "Egyptian Tea" was quite tasty, and reminded me a bit of peppermint. Karen said she could taste the hibiscus, but... not knowing what hibiscus tastes like, I remained ignorant (Karen had actual egyptian tea once while in Egypt). Karen was excited because she got to practice her arabic on the waiter.

When we came out of the teahouse, it was raining. However, there was also a double rainbow! (in this picture, you can -barely- see the second rainbow above the first. Its easiest to see where it hits into the second highest palm frond).



A propitious omen, indeed!

Our bus was delayed on account of massive traffic (not only does pretty much everyone in the country get the last two days of holy week off, it was flooding in Malaga earlier), so we ended up getting back pretty late.

Today is just relaxing, and probably catching one more procession before heading off to Rome.

RANDOM Pics:



The city of Malaga. We got completely lost and turned around and misdirected several times while searching for a tea shop Karen thought she remembered. To the left of the picture is the port, to the right mountains.



Sphinx-like statue on a monument near the Mezquita.

Some observations:

1) Spanish cars run on diesel. At least that is what Karen told me. Because of this, the cars seem to rumble a bit more while riding in them. Anyway, every Spanish car also need its brakes checked. There are many little plazas with one way streets connecting to them. Drivers then have to circle around the plaza, sometimes at a pretty tight angle. And every time they do, their breaks squeek something awful. Hah! As I was writing this, a car had to stop because of traffic outside, and I was again subjected to that abominable breaking sound. Karen says that she thinks this is because of the change in temperature, waht with it being Spring now. Considering that it changed from "a little cool" to "a little warm", I don´t think this can explain everything.

2) When meeting Spanish women, you kiss them on their right cheek, than their left. This is something that took me by surprise the first time I met one of Karen´s friends. Luckily, you can just shake hands with the men.

3) Spanish sidewalks are usually made of tiles in lieu of concrete. The trouble with this is that they often become slippery. I´m wearing my shoes from work, and sliding all over the place, especially when there is an unexpected drop. I also believe that the costa del sol is covered in an invisble layer of dust, thus making already slippery sidewalks even slicker.

4) I met a man who went to the bank to -buy dollars- because the US dollar is so weak now. *sigh*


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Okay, so I have to share a couple more pictures from Semana Santa, if only because the costume the Penitents wear has different connotations in the US. So, Sunday, we got to see some adults carrying Thrones (the official name of the floats). These thrones were a bit larger and more elaborate than those carried by the children.



This is the beginning of the procession.



Here is a closeup of the pentitents. These ones apparently did not put the cones in their hoods. The parade moved incredible slow. Generally, it took them an hour to go down a street. They´d move forward a few feet, then pause for five minutes. As such, some tweens/teenagers would go out into the parade as it paused and talked to the people they knew.



Here is picture of the Jesus throne, and the people carrying it.



Children holding long candles followed the Jesus throne. Children in the crowd with foil balls would then walk out into the parada and have the children holding the candles drop wax onto the foil balls and light them. Unfortunately, I do not know the significance of this.



Here is the throne of Mary.

The throne of Mary was the last in the parade. A band followed her, with strangely empty streets behind. As you can see from the first picture to the last, several hours passed by the time the whole parade went by.

On Monday, Karen called a friend in a nearby town, Neraj. Her friend, Rocio (or Rocia, I´m going to have to find out), came out to Velez and picked us up. We went back to Neraj and had lunch with Rocio and her husband. They chose a fish place "La Marina", and ordered several plates of food that we all shared.

Mussels - not really to my taste. Mostly because, as I cracked one open, I could pick out appendages in detail, and couldn´t help but imagine the little tentacles / tendrils / arms as I swallowed it. I... could not make myself eat another.

Croquettes - traditional Spanish food. I believe it is a fried potato ball with meat mixed in. Apparently Jaquin, Rocio´s husband, said these were very low quality. Karen agreed, and told me not to give up on them until I tried some homemade croquettes.

Gambas Rebozadas - fried shrimp. These were quite tasty.

Some little fried Calamari things - they tasted okay, but I don´t know how much I like the salty fried taste combined with chewy squid.

Pollak - very delectable fish.

Bequerones - little fish with a light breading. You just pop them in your mouth holding while holding the tail. I liked them well enough, and tried not to imagine them as fish.

Berojenas w/ sugar cane honey - I guess this is a desert dish. Fried slices of eggplant that you drizzle sugar cane honey over. It was also very good.

It was also during this lunch that I told Karen not to tell me what anything was until well after I had swallowed it.

After lunch, Jaquin went back to work, (he was on siesta, hah!), while Rocio took us up to the Cave of Neraj. This is Nerja´s tourist trap, I suppose. It´s one of the largest calcium caves in Europe, I guess, and, deeper in the cave, has neolithic cave paintings. Alas, more than two thirds of the cave is closed to the public. However, what is open is impressive. However, as they told us not to take pictures, what with the flash damaging the stalagtites (i believe), I have none. It was a -bit- disappointing since so much of the cave was closed, but... ah, well.



Rocio led us to a community of houses overlooking the sea. It had a little flowered path that led up from the beach, complete with pools and waterfalls. Here is a picture looking up at some of the houses.



Here is a picture of Neraj from the "Balcony of Europe". It was named this by some visiting Spanish king, I believe. It´s a piece of land that juts out into the Mediterranean.

Rocio dropped us off right near Karen´s salsa class so that she catch the last fifteen minutes of class. After they were finished, one of the women served Empanadas, Galician style. These were also excellent, though my stomach was very full by the end of the day.
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The next day, we went to Malaga to check out the Alcazab (Moorish Fortress) and the Pablo Picasso Museum. The museum, alas, did not allow photography. However, the main thing I took away from it was that Picasso had many children with many women.



Cathedral in Malaga. Most impressive, though we did not go in. We were running late, and I figure I´ll get my fill of cathedrals in Italy. Also, Karen had been in it before.



This is the Alcazab, taken from one of the lower levels. The Alcazab is my favorite of the things we´ve seen so far.



Karen resting in the Fortress.



Malaga, its bullring, and the Mediterranean.



The Alcazab has several sources of water, with channels carved into the rock that lead down to a central fountain. You can follow the trail of water from the left to the right of the bottom of the picture. It then falls down a hole and enters a channel on the lower level, from which it curves around to the right, circling the central square, until it flows into the center from the right. You can´t see it going around the perimeter because of the walls, but the water approaching from the top right of the picture and going left to the fountain is the same channel that started at the bottom of the picture.



This is one of the many gardens inside the fortress.

So, anyway, that´s what I´ve got for now. Tomorrow we plan to head up to Córdoba to see the Mezquita.

Velez!

Velez-Malaga. They will crush ALL!

I got lost for the first time today! Woo!

Admittedly, in Kyoto, it was a lot easier to find my way back. Mostly because Kyoto is laid down on a grid and bounded by mountains. It was easy enough to always just travel 'east' or 'west' until you met up with the main road. In Velez-Malaga, it´s more or less 'travel downhill in a zig-zagging line that doubles back on itself'. After a few turns down some very thin 'motorcycle only' streets, i had the bright idea to continue to turn down progressively larger streets until I finally found my way back to a main street (ie, follow the motorcycle only lanes until I reach a one-way car lane. Follow that until I reach a two-way lane. Follow that until I reach the plazas / something recognizable on my map). Surprisingly enough, this worked. I stopped and asked a shop keeper for directions about halfway there, largely because i lost faith in my plan. It´s funny how, even if you start a conversation with "No hablo espanol", then ask for directions, most of the directions will be in spanish. I´m sure the same would be true of a non-english speaker asking me for instructions.

So, here was my part of the conversation:

"No hablo Español"
"Uhh... apple" (apple sounds a lot like some sort of vegetable, and I had fogotten the word for 'apple'. I am woefully unprepared language wise, so....)
"Manzanas!"
"Si, una"
"¿Donde esta... aqui?"

Then lots of nodding as I kinda understood what she said. The essential information was 'turn left out of the shop'.


The tower on the right was my destination for the next day. This picture was taken from Karen´s roof.

Anyway, what led to my getting lost was a trip because I left early this morning to head to 'La Forteleza', or 'The Fortress'. Karen wanted to sleep in and has seen it many times, so i braved Velez on my own. Karen´s original directions on how to reach it were "travel uphill". I essentially refused to accept these instructions, so she pointed out a more standard set of directions of streets to take. The next morning, well... I couldn´t find street names so just kinda... "went up". Taking the uphill route at every intersection was a surprisingly good route.


This is the main tower through an arch. The main tower is essentially the only building still standing. Most of the walls are crumbling, but fun to walk around.


This is the main tower, and some of the local vegetation.


Here is a view of Velez.

Hmm... alright, time to go back to the beginning...

The flight to Spain was pretty uneventful. I really liked my flight on Air France, despite travelocity not reserving the seat I requested. I ended up with another aisle seat about eight rows behind the one I asked for. Anyway, Air France met with my approval largely because the seats were comfortable and there were little terminals on the back of each seat, with on demand movies and video games. While the games aren´t very sophisticated, a round of a Space Invader clone helped to pass the time. The movies selection wasn't too bad, either.

Anyway, I eventually made way to Velez, after angering one bus driver by not answering his spanish question quick enough. Karen´s instructions, which were essentialy to go to the Internet cafe I'm in right now, were quite good. We were able to meet up. After going to the super market and picking up some dinner, we headed out to see the first of the Saint's Week processions.

Saint's Week

I guess the event we followed and crashed -was- technically a part Saint´s Week. It turns out it was a procession by the Brotherhood of the (something? Lost, I think) Mary. However, we learned this after followed the crowd into the church and pushed our way into a corner (not exagerrating), and stood through a fourty five minute slideshow presentation of what this group has done for Velez. The mayor of Velez spoke, as did other prominent citizens. Karen said it was pretty standard fare 'things are going good, keep reaching high, etc', and not really worth translating.


The next day, we went out to watch the Children's parade. Groups of children carried floatsof various sorts through the streets. The main provision was that the children had to all be fourteen years of age or less. Karen saw some of the students she knew.


There was a huge crowd watching the procession.


This was the largest float in the parade. I'm calling them floats, but I don´t know if that's really the word. I want to call them Arks!


It had been blocking traffic earlier.


Children of all ages participated! Though, if they were any younger than these, usually they walked along aside, carrying banners or drums or little bugles. Until they tired and their parents picked them up or put them in strollers, that is.


The Bell-Ringer had a very important job. When the floats in front would stop for whatever reason, this girl had to ring the bell to let the others know it was time to put theirs down. Later on, when the procession restarted, she was to ring it again: one ring signalle 'pick it up'. Two rings let them know to 'move forward'.

This girl was especially vigilant and seemed to take her task very seriously. She is also in one of Karen's classes.

Mediterranean Sea


After that, we headed down to the Mediterranean, and I got to wade in! Here´s a pic of Velez from the east. Karen also got a nice picture of me wading in, with this coastline behind me, but alas! I don´t have her camera on me right now.

We had dinner at a Thai place (haha, I have yet to have Spanish food... perhaps tonight).


Statue of a poet (i forget who, unfortunately) in Velez.

Anyway, so that´s what´s up for now. The itinerary I listed out earlier will change a bit, though. We won´t be going to Morocco this trip, which is a bit disappointing. Travelling between the cities, what with the mountains and traffic, isn´t as efficient as I thought it might be, and not really conducive to day trips. However, most of the other stuff should be the same.

Spring 2008: Spain and Italy

So, -this- edition of Charlie's Travelogue will cover Spain and Italy.

I will be landing in Malaga, Spain, on 14 March. Malaga is a moderately sized city (around half a million people), and is the second most populous metropolitan area of Andalucia, the region that comprises much of southern Spain. From Malaga, I will make my way east to the town of Velez-Malaga, where my friend Karen has lived for the past six months, teaching English to Spanish elementary school students. The itinerary for this part of the trip is not yet established, but it will involve Moorish architecture, Phoenician tombs, Morocco, a Saints Week Festival, and, if I have my say, Monkeys. After all, a trip across an ocean would not be complete for me unless I got to see los Monos. Luckily, Gibraltar is home to the only wild monkeys in Europe! Now if only I can convince Karen to go there...

On 22 March, I will bid Karen farewell and board a plane for the Eternal City, Rome! On 23 March (EASTER!), one of my friends from college will be landing in Rome to join me in exploring the country. Coincidentally, she is also named Karen. Our plans involve a few days in Rome, taking in the major sites, visiting the Pope, and exploring catacombs, necropoli, and ruins, before taking a train north to Florence. Along the way, we hope to stop at some of the smaller hill towns in the Tuscany region. From Florence, we will circle back down to Rome, and try to make our way to Abruzzo - a region to the East of Tuscany that is famed for its hiking and mountains. However, much of this beyond the first few days is still up in the air.

As it was last time, I shall endeavor to update this blog as much as possible, and provide pictures and descriptions such that you, Dear Reader, may travel vicariously through me. I can't make many promises, of course, as Karen does not have internet at her apartment in Spain, but I shall do my best. If all else fails, I will do a 'mega photo dump' onto my flickr account once I return.

PS> All my old Japan posts are still here, and I can't think of any good way to clean it up so that posts older than one year are invisible. This seems cluttered, but... ah well.

PPS> Also, my flickr site, for those who may be curious, is here.