An afternoon in Retiro Park, Madrid

Wrote this for my global communications class, but enjoy

I arrived in Madrid’s Retiro Park after 4:00 p.m. on a Sunday, having spent most of the day asleep, and a further two hours of the afternoon eating chocolate and magdalenas at my host family's behest.

It was late now – to say nothing of the cold and glowering weather – and I was frustrated with myself for having wasted so much time. Had I woken earlier, I would have maybe stopped at the Palacio de Cristal, as I’d done some days before, or walked as far as the sweet potato seller who roasts potatoes and corn cobs and other starchy things on the sidewalk outside of the Reina Sofia.

But 4:00 was too late for any of that, so I wandered aimlessly around the west side of the park, idly looking for something to do.

Retiro Park is, in general, a very good place for idle people. In fact, it was originally created just for that purpose: the park was once the stomping grounds and gardens of Spain’s court and royal family, who idled there from the 1500s until the mid-eighteenth century.

Now, even in the cold or during the bustle of the week, madrileños flock here by the hundreds, just to sit on the grass, or to drink a café, or to skate through the lines of little orange cones that dot the streets and sidewalks exactly for that purpose.

But since I had spent half the afternoon in bed, I soon became determined to rent some skates and see Retiro like a jóven madrileña.

Little did I know, it’s impossible to rent skates in Retiro – or in Madrid at all, for that matter. I started by scoping out one of the rounded, vaguely silo-like kiosks on the park’s west side, expecting to see a sign or a poster of some sort. (There are none).

I then began to lurk around groups of skaters, waiting for an “in,” watching as they spun around their cones or passed a hockey ball around the circle, exclaiming loudly when anybody missed it. I got a few curious glances but no offers of low-cost rentals. In either case I was still wasting time, and by now it was getting dark.

Desperate, at this point, and feeling very severely that I had lost a day of my life, I stomped up to a bow-tied waiter outside of a café and demanded to know, in my accented Spanish, where I could rent some rollerskates. That is unfortunately a quite literal translation. Since I did not know the word for rollerskates, I had to finish with a lame:

“Sabes dónde puedo alquiler unos … rollerskates?”

Older Spanish men often take pity on my terrible accent and gaping vocabulary. In fact, I have found that it is best to ask them for help in nearly any situation.

“Alquiler?” He said, helpfully.

“Sí.”

“Bicis?”

This, I feared, would be the sticking point. He thought I wanted to rent a bike.

“No, no,” I said, emphatically, “para los pies.”

I pointed to my feet and did a strange little roller-dance to illustrate the matter. Nodding and smiling widely, the waiter informed me that the word I was looking for was patinas, and that I could not rent them anywhere in the entire city of Madrid – much less in Retiro Park.

Still smiling, he returned to refilling the napkins at all the outdoor café tables. It was almost dark, at this point, and the tables were full of people doing absolutely nothing: old men squabbling amongst each other, young couples talking quietly, an elderly grandmother pulling a leashed infant away from the nearby curb.

In fact, it suddenly struck me that this solitary waiter was the only one busying himself with productive work, and everyone else in the park was doing whatever the hell they wanted.

“Tienes café aquí?” I asked him.

“Claro,” he said.

And so this wasted Sunday, on which I did pretty much nothing, ended up being the most “Spanish” day of my trip thus far.

It’s strange, and strangely liberating, to pass time without any sort of goal or purpose. But al fin de todo, I think that’s largely what the Spanish are all about.

Photo: Snow in Madrid

This was the view out our kitchen window this morning. Miki said that before this winter, it hadn’t snowed in Madrid in years.

Unfinished Business

Classes officially ended today, and all of my work is finally turned in, just need to do some studying for Finals. After class, I went too the park and I took some time over the past few days to look back on the semester, and I realized that although I’ve been here for months, there’s still plenty of things I haven’t done. So here they are:

1. Travel to these countries/cities:

Zurich (Switzerland)
Prague (Czech Republic)
Munich and Berlin (Germany)
Italy (Florence, Milan, Rome, Venice)
Vienna, Austria

2. Find out the names of girls who works behind the bars at Dubliners and O'Connells – not only are they nice, casual conversation might lead to free drinks.

3. Go to the Serrano 41 at least twice – one must be on a Tuesday and the other on a Friday.

4. Money permitting, rent and wear a kilt to the May Ball in Scotland – enough said.

5. Do well in my classes – if I don’t, this whole experience is a bust.

6. Play golf at St. Andrews in Scotland - the birthplace of golf. They have 7 courses.

How To ... Make Spain's Best Cocktail On A Budget

We’re all probably familiar with sangria, the addicting wine-based cocktail that is often served at bridal showers, Mexican restaurants and aspirational barbecues.

But if you, like me, are on a very tight budget, you might want to acquaint yourself with tinto de verano, sangria’s lesser-known Spanish cousin. Not only is it much cheaper to make than sangria, but it’s also costs less than half as much at restaurants — plus it isn’t considered a “tourist drink.”

To make your own:

Go shopping. To make eight glasses, you will need one bottle of red wine, two cans of lemon Fanta, Casera or Sprite and a lemon or orange for garnish.

Mix it up. I make mine with a ratio of three-fourths wine, one-fourth Fanta, but you can do pretty much whatever you want. It’s kind of a guess-and-see-how-it-goes type deal.

Dish it out. Tinto de verano is traditionally served on the rocks with a lemon or orange slice for garnish. If you’re not down with tradition, though, this is a pretty garnish-able drink: you could add rum to it, you could add Triple Sec, you could likely add all kinds of fruits.

I’m actually going to this girls apartment and making this tomorrow night, and I guess we're going to try it with lemon Fanta, oranges, peaches and cherries.

The best part, though, is that the peaches and cherries will likely be the most expensive part of the drink. Made four glasses last weekend with her with one can of Fanta and half a bottle of one-euro wine.

Culture Shock: The Spanish just do not dig plaques

Visiting Madrid’s old Royal Palace was simultaneously one of the most interesting and most aggravating things I’ve done in Spain.

On one hand, the extravagance of the 18th-century palace was totally engrossing, and the opportunity to trudge through the rooms where kings once ate breakfast and played pool was sick, to say the least. But every time I was curious about something – an elaborate painting, a weird piece of furniture, the function of a misshaped room – I was absolutely out of luck.

The Spanish hate plaques. There are none to be found anywhere.

This is difficult for Americans, who are used to seeing historical placards, commemoratives and other explanatory notices posted everywhere. If the United States had a royal palace, you can guarantee that its curators would put plaques on every item that didn’t move:

“This is the bench where so-and-so did such-and-such.” “This wallpaper is a prime example of this obscure style, which we are now going to discuss at length.” “This air conditioner was not a part of the original building, but was added in 1972.”

In Spain, on the other hand, you will be lucky to track down a small, rather awkwardly written blurb, which only specifies that Goya did in fact paint the portrait in the far left corner.

Maybe they’re trying to make money off guidebooks (nice try, Spain — you will get nothing from me). But I think it’s more likely that, in many cases, people just aren’t as hung up on history.

After all, you can’t walk 10 feet in Spain without running into a Roman ruin or a medieval castle or some sort of elaborate, storied cathedral. History here is like a matter of course.

Whereas at home, even one-time brothels and obscure drinks merit attention. Lame, perhaps — but informative!

Top 10

Done traveling so here is my top 10 on the trips I've taken here in Spain. In order of most enjoyed:

1. London
2. Paris
3. Lisbon
4. Amsterdam
5. Ibiza
6. Ireland
7. Germany
8. Greece
9. Barcelona
10. Seville

In case you’re craving Mexican food in Madrid …

I think a lot of people come to Spain with the (grave) misconception that Spanish and Mexican foods are more or less one and the same. Not only is that untrue — have you ever seen me blog about a burrito? — it can also be pretty hard to find Mexican food in Madrid. Which, at times, is problematic.

Yesterday afternoon for instance, a few girls and I decided we’d go for margaritas, mojitos, whatever after our exam. Our professor’s name is Margarita, and she’s fond of using this weird, self-referential speech mechanism wherein she’ll explain something and then pretend to be a student with a question, i.e. “blah blah blah — pero Margarita, ¿por quéeeee?”

So post-exam margaritas were obviously in order. After hauling out to Plaza de España, however, and discovering that our selected Mexican restaurant did not in fact exist, we were forced to improvise a little. And by improvise, I mean wander-into-the-most-cheesily-decorated-Latin-American-restaurant-within-a-five-mile-radius.

This, amigos, brings us to La Llama, perhaps the best lunch decision I have ever made (as most of you know, I don't eat lunch much).

For starters, it’s called La Llama — please allow that comedy to sink in — and decorated with paper streamers and all kinds of knick-knacks from Peru. The waitress was perhaps the nicest lady ever. And the food was awesome: I had pork chops with mango sauce.

Our food also came with a incredible (fattening?) array of carbohydrates: bread, rice, french fries, papas rellenas … all in all, a lot of stuff for less than 10 euros. AND it was my first time trying Peruvian food, which was pretty cool.

Sadly, this did mean that we had to put off our drinks until around 10, when we accidentally chanced upon a Mexican restaurant in Chueca. Fifteen euro will buy you a pitcher of really good margaritas and mojitos.

The End is Near

The end of the semester that is… We only have about a week and a half left of class, which means all the work I’ve put off over the course of the semester needs to get done. That translates into a very ordinary week – probably won't do much other than go to class and write papers.

My Out of This World Adventure to Amsterdam

Brace yourselves, this is going to be a long one – I just got back from my two day excursion to Amsterdam (after only a one layover in Madrid from Greece). It’s a crazy city, and even though we were only there for two days, I’m pretty sure I experienced everything Amsterdam had to offer and then some. Two days was more than enough and I don’t think my body could take any more. It’s the most tired I’ve been after a weekend trip.

For a city that’s not that cosmetically appealing, I think I can say that it has been one of my favorite cities so far. It’s a canal city, which overall is pretty sweet, although I had a love/ hate view of them. They’re ridiculously dirty, and they’re filled with run down boats that looked like they haven’t been touched in twenty years, but at the same time, there’s a ton of decked out house boats lining the banks and seeing canals in the middle of the city in general is pretty cool.

I’ve never seen so many bikes in my entire life, I kid you not. There are bike racks literally on every street corner, and at busy points they have multi layered bike rack/ parking garages for bikes only. The bike lanes on the road are bigger than those for cars. Just like some of the boats in the canals, I’m pretty sure some of the bikes on the racks haven’t been touched in a few years either – some are rusted beyond repair.

Now onto what everyone wants to hear about - the coffee houses. Pretty crazy stuff. Even if you don’t plan on taking advantage of any of the amenities yourself, it’s still cool just to watch people nonchalantly buy drugs over the counter that are illegal in the US.

In actuality, there are probably plenty of things to do in Amsterdam, but all we really cared about was the Heineken factory, the Red-light district, the Van Gogh Museum, and the Anne Frank House. So first on the list was the Heineken factory, which actually turned out to be more of a museum. It was run by guys about my age, who didn’t exactly seem like experts, but the museum itself is sick and you get two free pints of beer at the end.

Before the Heineken factory, we got some Doner kebabs for lunch. They seem to have those in every European city, which is good for us because we’re addicted at this point. Gotta love street meat.

We did a lot of walking around that afternoon, and that night, we hopped over to the Red-light district. Talk about crazy, I have never seen anything like it. It’s just straight up neon lights, fast food joints, euro rave bars, and any form of erotic entertainment you could possibly think of. I’ll leave it at that for now, if anyone wants to know more, send me a message.

There are these fast food bar type restaurants where they sell fries in a paper cone. Best thing ever.

We hit up the Van Gogh Museum and Anne Frank House Sunday morning. As for Van Gogh - I could appreciate it for what it was – he does actually have some pretty cool paintings. If you are into Van Gogh or know anything about art, you’d be in heaven.

Then we went to the Anne Frank House, the line was probably a mile long, but luckily I bought my ticket online so got to go right to the front. It was amazing to see where Anne Frank's family lived during the holocaust and you could tell it was hard for some people to walk through the house, some people were VERY emotional. It was very powerful. The house had original bookcases, wall paper, flooring, staircases, blackout curtains and bathroom fixtures and you really see how they lived. You could feel the stuffy presence left behind from the 8 who lived there. This is something everyone should see. To say that the rooms are haunting would be an understatement. If you are one of those people who tend to believe in ghosts, like me, there were plenty of 'cold spots' in the whole house, but especially in the upstairs living quarters. I don't understand how some can call it boring, considering the well-documented history contained within the walls.

I have read Anne Frank's diary many times for school, so I really appreciated seeing the annex. It was just how I pictured it and I enjoyed seeing some original pages from the diary. One of the last rooms you enter has Anne's actual diary in a glass case with a single light above shining down on an open page. To see her handwriting on those pages brought it all home for me.

Anyways, we flew home Sunday morning, and that was the weekend. Can’t say I’m in any rush to go back right this second, but if the opportunity did come up at some point in the future, I’d go in a heartbeat.

Top 5 Things You Should Never Do When Spending a Weekend in Amsterdam

Like the commercial says, Amsterdam is a “dam” good city. But there’s a few mistakes you can make that will ruin your trip. Now I’m no expert on the Dutch penal code, but I’ve picked up a few tips while I was there that will make your trip a lot more memorable. Here they are:

1. Don’t buy drugs from anyone in the streets, especially in the Red-light district at night. There are a few reasons for this, the first of which is really common sense. You have no idea who’s selling it to you, and you have no idea what it’s laced with. Second, while smoking marijuana is “tolerated” in coffee shops, sale of it on the streets is illegal. Cops are pretty lax, but they do have the power to arrest you if they feel like it.

2. Don’t take pictures of the girls in the Red-light district. I don’t know the legality of it, but I know they don’t take very kindly to tourists snapping shots of them in their underwear. It’s not like they can’t open the glass doors/ windows and come after you, and possibly yell at you (I saw it happen first hand). Everyone wants to bring back memories, but it’s not worth being harassed by a prostitute (for some of you, maybe it is). If you’re really desperate to take pictures, do it from afar.

3. Don’t ignore the advice of the staff at the coffee shops. Most places have a full menu of amenities to choose from, and I guarantee you don’t know what they all are. It’s a well known fact that the weed in Amsterdam is extremely strong, so if you don’t know what you’re smoking, there’s a good chance you’ll get hit hard. The staff knows what they’re doing, and they have no reason to mess with you, so take their advice and use it wisely.

4. Don’t try to bring your own drugs, especially hard drugs, into coffee shops. I don’t think it’s illegal to bring in your own drugs, but you wouldn’t bring your own beer to a bar, and I would assume it’s the same with marijuana. The Netherlands makes a distinction between hard and soft drugs, meaning the only drugs that are tolerated are marijuana and hash. Shop owners appreciate the fact that they can sell marijuana, and don’t want their shop disrupted because someone decided to bring in LSD.

5. Don’t smoke so much that you can’t remember your trip. I guess this is actually a matter of preference. Maybe you want to sit in a coffee shop high out of your mind for your entire trip, but for those who actually want to visit the sites and remember what they saw, pay attention to how much you smoke. Like I said, the marijuana in Amsterdam is very strong, so if you smoke too much, you’ll be done for the day. Things like the Heineken factory cost close to $20 to see, and if you’re too gone to remember it, or to take advantage of the free beer at the end, then you’ve really just wasted 20 bucks.

Again, I’m not an expert on any of this – I was only there for a weekend. But I would put money down that most of this post is pretty accurate.

The Final Countdown

The countdown has really begun. My flight back to the States is on December 4, so that leaves me with roughly 3 more weeks here in Madrid. It’s definitely going to be bittersweet. I’m anxious to get back home, but Madrid has become kind of like a second home after living here for 4 months. In all seriousness, I actually wonder what it’s going to be like next month, not being able to wake up in the morning and go into the big city, having class more than two days a week, not jet setting to different countries on the weekends…

I'm a Nomad

My life in Madrid is beginning to look more like this: 3 or 4 weekdays in Madrid, and then off gallivanting to another country for the weekends. Hey, not a bad life, right? Well, besides going through my Bank of America savings account like running water. In November alone, the trips include Germany, Greece, Amsterdam, and Lisbon, Portugal. Running through metros, catching buses, sleeping in hostels, “camping out” in airports for 5 hours, going through airport security wearing last night’s outfit, waiting in train stations, arriving in train stations and realizing I missed the last train, and taking taxis…sure jet-setting is fun and thrilling, but being warm and indoors at the cozy apartment of my Madrid family is very nice too. Estoy muy contenta estar en madrid ... Had a nice one day break in Madrid, but back in the sky tomorrow. Off to Amsterdam!

Greece.

Strange experience, had it's ups and downs. Going to let it settle in and marinate for a moment and will discuss later, but it was is pretty cool, but definitely not all its cracked up to be. It might also be better if you weren't visiting in the middle of national turmoil, etc. and if I had unlimited money (and time) to visit all the island resorts (need to learn the language first -- donations are welcomed and encouraged). Athens isn't really a trip in itself.

PS. Donations are welcome and much appreciated for my fund to help me buy "Rosetta Stone: Greek" for me this Christmas/ 22nd Birthday.

Need To Get This Off My Chest.

Dear Spanish couples,

Look, I get it. This isn’t America. People are allowed to express their affections more freely in public on this side of the Atlantic. To a certain extent, that’s great. Catching the occasional glimpse of two high school kids eating each other’s faces is fine because that means that I, too, have the privilege – nay, the right - to eat face in public as well.

But you gotta draw the line somewhere.

Last week, I entered a metro stop to meet up with some friends before a night out. When I walked onto my platform, I quickly realized that there were just three people waiting for the next train: Myself, a woman sitting on a bench, and her boyfriend, who was face-deep in her chest, “motorboating” her bosoms in a circular motion.

Clearly, a guy like me who grew up in prude, puritanical America has no point of reference for what constitutes acceptable or unacceptable hard-core PDA here in Spain. Where I come from people have the decency to practice ALL of their more visceral affections in the privacy of their own home, or, at the very least, a place where they can find a few moments of privacy. Like the backseat of a vehicle. Or a guest room at a friend’s house. Or a walk-in freezer at the local IHOP.

You see, we Americans -- fat, uneducated and bad at soccer as we may be, have a strong set of values. We believe in freedom, justice and the unalienable rights to free speech, fair trials and gun ownership. We believe that two consenting adults have the right to do pretty much whatever they want to each other, wherever they want. However, we also believe that innocent bystanders have the right to NOT see two strangers going at it in public like a couple of apes on Animal Planet.

It’s the classic Catch 22 – how do we protect the preferences of the silent, less-handsy majority without violating the civil liberties of the noisy, sloppy minority who thinks that a bus stop is a great place to play “doctor” with their tongues?

Truth be told, there’s no easy answer. We could revert to American rules, which subject the publicly affectionate among us to loud throat-clears and dirty looks anywhere outside of the aforementioned acceptable venues, but that would be downright draconian. Then again, we could eliminate the rules altogether and turn every street corner into an IHOP walk-in freezer, but who needs that much kissing, groping and maple syrup in their lives?

As in most of life’s great queries, the answer here lies somewhere in the middle. Every bystander deserves the right to stand up for themselves in public whenever some couple makes them feel like the third wheel in a wet dream, but we can all look the other way as long as they keep the volume down and the groping to a minimum, right?

So, let’s all join hands, work together, and in the spirit of international cooperation, draw a line that benefits both public affection-displayers and innocent bystanders. With your help, we can make public places safe for loving couples, and rid the world of public motorboating forever.

We can do this.

Sincerely,

Jonathan

My first Spanish wine-tasting leaves me just as uncultured as before

Last week, I had my first wine tasting experience. I have what could only be termed “extremely limited” experience with Spanish wine. In fact, if you know me you'll know that I usually run toward whatever’s cheapest and mixes best with Fanta Limón or Cranberry Juice.

Last Wednesday, however, I decided to class it up a bit and attend a bona fide Spanish wine tasting class, which was both awesome and absurd. I’m not sure my taste has improved, but I’ll probably be able to out-snob someone at a dinner party. That’s really all that matters, right?

If you’d like to impress your friends/Mom/coworker with your knowledge of Spanish wine, here are some fun facts:

- Spain has more vineyards than any country in the world and is the third wine producer after France and Italy.
- Spain boasts the market’s best value wines, a.k.a. cheap stuff that is still delicious.
- When you order a Spanish wine, you do it by region, not by type … except for cava, which is apparently cava everywhere.
- Rioja and Rueda are two of the most famous regions traditionally, but Bierzo and Priorat are trendy now.
- The Spanish government regulates wine-making and labeling pretty carefully. .

… and here are the wines we tried, complete with price in euros and my super-informed commentary:

Cava — Brut Imperial Gran Reserva Brut 2006 (Cataluna, 15) — Spanish champagne. The best.
White – Shaya Old Vine Verdejo 2006 (Rueda, 8 ) — Pretty good.
White – DV Chardonnay 2008 (Sierras de Malaga, 15) — Likewise pretty good, not sure why it’s twice the cost of the other one.
Red – Cantos de Valpiedra 2006 (Rioja, 5) — The “softest, fruitiest” red, according to our instructor. “
Red – Cepas Viejas 2006 (Bierzo, 12) — Loved it.
Red – Camins del Priorat 2007 (Priorat, 10) — And again.
Red – Valtosca 2007 (Jumilla, 17) — This was a step down, but OK.
Red – Bodegas Cuevas Jiminez (Ribera del Duero, 23) — This was only drinkable because I’d consumed seven glasses of wine already.

Please note that, true to form, my favorite red was the dead cheapest bottle of the bunch. Some things never change, my friends – even if I am holding the glass correctly, swirling it several times and making highbrow comments about “mineral flavors” and “fruity tones.”

Lo Siento

I apologize for the spotty posting this week … I do have midterms right now, so whenever I’m near a computer, it’s usually to Google the definition of an occlusive consonant or to research the socio-economic status of Spanish youth or something unblog-able like that.