ESPAÑA EN TRES PARTES. DOS; 5/28, Granada It is past midnight on a Saturday night and outside our hotel window three floors down, a modern garbage truck is collecting refuse. My tito (uncle) Antonio put us up here, a block from his apartment, so that we would be comfortable. We are. Spaniards just have a different set of hours. Dinner at 11pm, talking until 1. I like it. Antonio is a seller of real estate here in the old portion of Granada and he knows everyone after having lived here 20 some years. He knows the man who built this hotel. A block away is a strip of bar/restaurants with outdoor tables which sits astride a quaint plaza. By 10pm, the place was packed and buzzing with conversation. Cervezas, tinto de verano (wine with fruit-flavored carbonation) and tapas (small plates of finger foods) flowing. There are people of all ages here. Old folks to young ones with baby strollers. An ancient, craggly-faced peanut vendor makes the rounds singing his pitch. We drink and eat for a couple hours. The food is mostly fish in Spain and my uncle explains that Spain is the 3rd largest consumer population of fish in the world... and has the 2nd largest fishing fleet. It’s good. I’m no historian. Didn’t go to college. I’m an American lucky enough to be here in a town which has an amazing past... with locals who know the history, one I can only translate in layman’s terms from what I picked up in two days. Granada sits at the base of the Sierra, Nevada mountains—the biggest in Spain, and much of Europe. It exists because of a place called the Alhambra, which started out Moorish over 1,000 years ago. The Moors conquered Spain at some point and inhabited this place for over 800 years before the Roman’s came in, tore the main mosque down and built an obtrusive monument to some emperor. Then came the church and their armies (who laid siege to the place for over 8years, and as a result created a sister city, eventually called Santa Fe, just to the South West). And so, now, bits of all these eras remain in this peaceful and beautiful setting. A massive, fortified castle surrounding a huge Roman building with a circular atrium and what remains of a Moorish palace. The contrasts here are startling. Big, heavy stone obtrusions vs. airy, comfortable and lavish living spaces with insane artisan detail. Fountains and gardens permeate the place. At the Patio de los Leones in the palace you can become lost in relaxation—if it weren’t for all the visitors. Outside, on the castle tower, you are frightened by the reasons the tower exist—but you look out over Granada, the town that grew up around the castle and it is truly breathtaking. I hate that word, but it works here. Amazing. Granada is a college town. Over 20,000 students from all over the world. This seems to add a cosmopolitan edge to the city that, again, is a stark contrast to much of the ancient surroundings. My three cousins here, Charia, Fatima and Nasiba fit right in (though Charia goes to film school an hour south in Malaga, on the coast). Modern girls. 19, 17 and 14. Charia is tall and thin, very hip, and looks amazingly like Sofia Coppola with short hair. Fatima has orange hair and a sharp chrome piercing just under her lower lip. She is quiet and listens to a progressive Spanish/Celtic band through headphones most of the day she is with us... though she really hits it off with Emmet. Says she wants to keep him. Nasiba is the youngest and is startlingly beautiful. At 14 she is already taller than her 17 year-old sister. She has a dark complexion, straight black hair and barely speaks. She also has a piercing just above her right eye on the brow. On Sunday she tells her mother, Ana Marie, she’s not feeling well and stays home. Seems she was out late (as where her sisters) the night before. A complaint I hear a lot from the older generation is that the kids stay out all night and don’t get any sleep. But noone stops them. I can’t really get a take on wether there’s a drinking problem with teens here. The whole attitude around alcohol is completely different than in the US. It’s just around and noone really seems to abuse it—as far as I can tell. Teens don’t seem that interested in it. My primo Antonio tells me that when college kids (or military personnel) come from the UK or Germany or the US, they are surprised by the cheap price of alcohol and drink until they drop. Literally. But the locals don’t seem to do that. In Spain, people know how to relax and the general atmosphere here doesn’t have the tension that it does back home. They’re not trying to cram in the relaxation between work and sleep. This is not an anal retentive culture. Their is no striving for perfection, nor are they worried about it. Most everyone smokes, they eat a crazy sausage called chorizo (delicious) and deep fried dough called churros—and they don’t care. The passions here are in the day-to-day living. And there seem to be lots of old people... Leave it to a foreigner to over-simplify. Forget what I just wrote. I like it here. It’s easier, but that may only be because I’m on vacation. Anyhow, these people were ruled by a dictator up until the mid-70s when he died and their modern constitution was written. They’re due a little relaxation. 5/29, Capileira We drove about an hour and a half south into the Sierra Nevadas. The winding mountain roads here are narrow and accommodate all sorts of traffic. We followed my tito Antonio in his Renault. He drives like he’s lived here 20 years. I enjoyed the chase up the mountain, but Lola and my mother were white-knuckled the entire trip, and doling out every sort of driving advice. I eventually put my Discman on. The road passed through the center of a few small towns, including Lanjarõn, the place where most of the bottled water in Spain comes from. All the buildings are white and stand out from the green mountain side. We kept climbing until we were almost to the summit and stopped in a village called Capileira. The mountain grade there seemed 45º at least. White brick buildings, stuccoed smooth on their exteriors, crawl all over the slopes there. It’s amazing. Multitudes of rose gardens speckle the place with brilliant color. Kelley points out that there’s no mildew on the plants... it’s dry here, but so green and colorful. We decided to live here. Ha. We walk like mountain goats through the narrow, steep street to eat lunch in una Casa de Comidas. The doorways here are all about 5 feet tall. Not sure why. The eatery is called Ibero and is very comfortable—like eating in someone’s home. Salads and many pre-meal treats known as tapas are eaten from communal plates. We eat the local cuisine, rabbit and smoked ham. Fatima eats a huge dessert of mixed fruit with cream that she called “super bueno.” We get back into Granada about 9pm, park on the sidewalk, and eat a small meal before leaving for Sevilla. Nasiba seems to be feeling better as she has about five of her friends packed into her small room... one by one they sneak out shyly get a look at the American primos. Ana Marie brings out a jug of water and asks us all to take a little and make a wish. The water was from a well in Mecca, where they had made a pilgrimage the previous year. Antonio and his wife Ana Marie are both devote Muslims and are both well studied. Walking through the Alhambra with him Saturday was quite a treat as he knew the history well. We say our goodbyes and Emmet cries as he doesn’t want to leave. We reach Sevilla by midnight and crash. 5/31, Sevilla We take a taxi into downtown to walk and shop a little. The stores all close in the afternoon for a few hours, but re-open at 5 or so until around 9. As we wander about I hear the first American voices of the whole trip (aside from Kel and Em). Any feeling of uniqueness I had dissipates immediately. Depressing. After a couple weeks here the language is really coming back to me, though not knowing it well enough to be completely fluent is like having a stutter. I’m always having to change sentences mid-stream to get around words I can’t think of fast enough. The silent gaps in my speech are excruciating—and no one attempts to fill in the missing words. Mostly out of politeness. They just listen... as I squirm. 6/1, Alcala de Guadaira The temperature has blasted through the roof. It’s so hot it’s all anyone can talk about. “Hase tanto CALOR!”* But we head to Alcala anyhow to see my tita Marie, her husband Antonio and my three primos, Antonio (three Antonios in the immediate family), 26, Santiago, 24, and Jose Andres, 16. All three boys still live at home in a nice house their father made in this small town 15 minutes south east of Sevilla. When we arrive at 3:30 in the afternoon, it is baking out. We stand in the sun for at least 15 minutes discussing were the best place to park the van is. If we put it here it has shade now, if we put it there it will have shade later...My whole family is this way. Kelley is pulling her hair out, “What are they saying? Can’t we just go inside?” Every single move we make is discussed this way. It is insane. Five or six adults, usually, to make one small decision. I’ve learned to go with the flow—I either tune out or just make a move, whatever my mood is at the time. I surprise myself with my patience. We have lunch, then sit, talking, for hours while Jose Andres switches channels on their digital TV faster than any American I know. Kel and Emmet are thrilled to see anything in English. I am just bored. Eventually the conversation gets redundant—how often can we talk about the different accents of Spaniards and Americans, or the weather, or olives, “the main Spanish export?” These people are so nice and generous. I guess our trip has reached that apex where you start to miss your routine from home—friends, places, foods, your bed. And it is just sooo damn hot, my clothes melt into the overstuffed couch. No one has air conditioning. Eventually I get so delirious and bored I start playing the human beat box, much to the delight of my son and bewilderment of my relatives. Then I just get up... time to go. I don’t care how hot it is outside, we’re going out there. We walk in the heat across a vacant, baked dirt field covered with broken Cruz Campos 40s until we reach the river which has a nice walkway. It’s shaded and seems nice, then Antonio tells us the water is usually classified as toxic. After a bit we find a nice park and let Emmet run wild in it. His first playground in two weeks. We’re back at the house by 9pm and it is still hot. The sun does set here until after 10 (did I already mention that?). We leave... but the leaving process here is always slow because there are so many people to say goodbye to individually. By 10:30 we’re in Sevilla and headed for bed. At night, upstairs in my grandmother’s house, it is impossible to sleep. Naked X on the bed, sweating. We quickly decide to head for the beach in the morning. * It's so HOT! 6/2, Matalascañas We’re back. It is still deserted mid-week. We swim, walk a lot and generally do nothing but relax and drink either cafe con leches, cervezas or tinto de veranos. Today, strolling along on the sand I whiteness my first topless woman (on the beach, that is)... I was picking up shells and when I looked up, and there they were. I tried so hard not to look I almost walked right into her. For a while after that I kept my eyes peeled behind my sunglasses. Every 10th woman was topless. My God, I’d imagined this as a youth... strolling a beach in the South of France and BAM, there they are. But this was nothing like that. This was the south of Spain and it seemed somehow... normal. So mundane. I surprise myself once again. I’m finishing up “Glimpses” for the 9th issue of Level mag. I’ll attempt to send it via the web when we get back to Sevilla. Finding a hole in the wall to plug in this laptop has remained an impossibility here at the beach. There are only payphones and cell phones. Everyone has a cell. On the beach there was a man, sitting in a chair under an umbrella talking loudly on a cell. And I thought there was a glut of these in LA... 6/3, Doñana Kelley almost blows up after Lola offers to go get fresh bread to make us sandwiches for the beach today. We’re feeling a little smothered by family and a bit like we’re being baby sat. We’re a pretty independent trio and to have my aunt and mother there most of the time, seemingly arguing about our next moves... well, let’s just say it gets overwhelming. The day old bread was just fine. We hit a reclusive beach just north of Matalascañas in hopes of avoiding the weekend crowd. It’s part of a large natural park called Doñana. Nudist beach to the left, fishing to the right. After parking the car on the side of the highway, we pay 200 pesetas and begin our trek on a wooden walkway which crosses the dunes. We walk atleast 3km up and down the hills. No shade. No ocean in site. Then we hear it. Ahhh. Dropping down the dunes onto the beach we are greeted by a mound of garbage around one small trash can. A depressing sight after the walk and the promise of a “natural park.” We avoid it and set up camp just down the beach—to the right, though I must admit, my eyes are peeled. The tide is very low but creeps up during the day forcing us to retreat towards the dune occasionally. The water is crystal clear and warm. We swim a lot and Emmet gets out into the “big water” with the use of an air donut and the aide of a parent or cousin.He absolutely can’t get enough. Standing on the shore later in the day he asks me to come out into the water again. I decline and he says, “Come on dad, we have to get in the water... we have to make some fun. Lets go make fun.” Who could say no to that? At just shy of 4 years-old Emmet sure knows a lot. When we feel the need to inform him of something, he always follows it up with the same reply, “I knew dat.” Kel and I go out with primo Antonio in the evening, leaving Em with his abuelas. We start with cafe con leches, then follow up with tinto be veranos and cervesas. Dinner up the strand at a randomly picked restaurant (Kelley made the call) called Los Pepes. We sit for a couple hours, eating (delicious food), talking and drinking before we head up the coast another kilometer or so to a large hotel which caters to Germans. We sneak in and sit down at the “discoteca” bar. Antonio knows the place and tells us it’s nickname is “Jurassic Park,” for the old clientele. Indeed. There is some C grade stage show going on for the German audience that scares us into finally leaving. Even the campyness had no appeal. 6/4, Matalascañas It’s Sunday afternoon and any resemblance to a ghost town is gone. The place is buzzing. All the parking spots near the beach are gone as well. Buses drop off loads of youth every 30 minutes or so. The apartment building is now filled with sounds and the smells of home-cooking. I take a nap in the afternoon and by the time I awake everyone is gone. The place is vacated again. Back to Sevilla they all went. We have the night and morning to ourselves before heading back as well. The plan is to spend the next few days/nights crawling around Sevilla before we head home on Friday. for PART UNO click here for PART TRES click here