Week In Review Sabbatical Style: T-2 days!

It's the last week in review from the road--can you believe it? I start my (many) flights home tomorrow. This week I left Thessaloniki for Milan and then made my way to Seville where I spent the majority of the week. I've taken a pretty relaxed approach this week and have just been enjoying catching up with good friends and enjoying the good life while I can. Some more tidbits from the week:

• I just finished doing what I hope is the LAST batch of laundry I do by hand in a long, long time. After doing laundry every single day on the Camino and about every third day for the rest of the last eight months, it is something that I definitely will not miss about traveling. 
• I am also pretty sick of wearing the same 3 things over and over again. 
• Within minutes of arrival in the bus station in Seville I already had a plate of tortilla Espanol, a cafe con leche and a person calling me guapa. I love this country. 
• Along with tortilla and cafe con leche I have been doing a great job of checking off the traditional Spanish dishes I try to eat while I am here (and also some of the ones I never got around to trying before). I've had gazpacho, flan, tinto de verano, paella, sardinas, rabo de toro (bull's tail), jamon, typical Sevillan fresh water fish, my favorite candies and all kinds of other goodies. 
• Food in Milan did not disappoint either!
• It has been so good to see friends this week--both from home and from the Camino. One of the bonuses is getting to walk around cities without having to read a map (a big plus for a directionally challenged person like myself!). 
• I've totally adopted the Spanish schedule this week--late lunch, siesta (it's seriously too hot to do anything else), and then dinner sometimes at midnight or later. It seems absurd until you are here. 
• Juanma and Maica's son Victor took me around Seville one evening, and I swear, he knows every single corner of Seville. We poked our noses in hidden patios, made laps around the giralda, took in some of the local scene, talked a bit of politics and had some good food. 
• What do Camino friends do when they get together? Go for a walk of course! Yesterday was the stuff Saturdays are made of. We woke up early for a walk up a neighboring hill for views of Sevilla, stopped on the way back for a breakfast of chocolate con churros, went to the spa (!), read and relaxed a while before having a bbq, took naps, saw outdoor theatre in the courtyard of an old Sevillan building and then closed the evening with a bit of flamenco. Now that is a Saturday!
• Today we drove for a while outside of the city to take in the Gruta de Las Maravillas in Aracena. They are Spain's largest caves and were full of huge and beautiful cave formations. Bellisima. 
• When I was in Milan David asked me if I liked cemeteries. Maybe it's weird--but I do. Milan's was fascinating! 
• After successfully ordering coffee all over the Balkans...I did myself in while in Italy. I ordered a latte, the waiter asked me some question, I made some answer and figured I would drink the coffee however it came. Except when it came...there was no coffee in it. Yep, I ordered myself a glass of milk. 
• I drank the milk like it was what I wanted. 

A lot more fun things happened this week, but seeing as it's the last day of my trip I think I'm going to go swim in Juanma and Maica's pool instead of writing anymore. Luckily though, I think I am finally ready to come home. My last two stops have definitely been softening the blow and reminding me how good it is to see familiar faces. So get ready people, my flights home (all 5 of them) start tomorrow! I'll land in DFW late on the 2nd! Hasta ahora! 

A few pictures below: 

My cup of steamed milk (...Well done, Lauren!)

Milan's cathedral. Very impressive. 

Milan's cemetery--go big or go home! (...or somewhere else?)

Maica, Juanma and our pile of fried fish goodness in Seville

Seville in the background as seen from a seminary just on the other side of the river

A bit of Aracena where we saw the caves today. 

Baile Folklorico

By happy chance I was in Boquete during a region wide (I think) celebration that brought in baile folklorico (traditional dance) and music groups from all around. Everyone got dressed up, paraded through town and then took turns dancing in the town square. It was a misty and cool day, but I loved taking it all in.

I was amused watching all of the dances thinking back to my experience with baile folklorico. When I was in high school I got placed in a native speaker's Spanish class because of scheduling conflicts or general incompetencies, or I don't even know what. Needless to say I was not a native speaker and was lost the whole time (embarrassing myself on several occasions). I finished the class without learning a lick of Spanish (but with a decent understanding of how to put accents on words). Anyway, when it got close to Cinco de Mayo, my teacher thought we should get in touch with our roots and learn some baile folklorico. My protests of not even being hispanic fell on deaf ears and I ended up spinning around in big skirts with the rest of my class. 

More pictures:

The tiny kids were my favorite. 

Week In Review

Welp, I have finished my second week in Brussels! A few random bits from the week:

• Today (Saturday) we fed the homeless--we made at least 400 butter and ham/cheese sandwiches and a giant tub of soup then fed almost 200 or so people at the main train station. I had a blast.
• It was nice to do something where language wasn't an issue.
• Afterwards we ate Domino's Pizza, which tasted almost exactly the same as Domino's stateside.
• Ta Sharafna--That's Arabic for Nice to meet you, but it's so fun to say it that I like to use it as an exclamation and/or insult.
• Friday I helped with the youth. For fun I gave them a random assortment of items and told them to build something that could transport an egg safely to the sidewalk from the third floor balcony.
• They were 2 for 4. I was surprised no one used the pillow case or trash-bag I gave them to make parachutes.
• By Tuesday I was really fed up with French.
• By today I had reconsidered. I also realized I have already picked up a surprising amount of French (at least when it comes to understanding).
• Probably the most used French word I have learned so far is méchant which translates more or less as mean, or mischievous.
• Hary told me I seemed older than 24. Why? He said it was because of my big head. Janee tried to persuade me that he was trying to say it's because I had such big (mature) thoughts.
• Méchant
• After dinner conversations have ended almost every night since I got here with Hary trying to persuade me to marry some random Arab guy or another.
• We registered 29 students for English classes. We are offering 2 grammar courses and a conversation class. Students range from Moroccan, Belgian and Brazilian to Congolese, Syrian and Sri Lankan.
• I adore our Moroccan neighbor's tiny 14 year old son Houssin. He even offered to bring over tea for us when we were doing inscriptions (registration).
• Actually, I pretty much love the entire family.
• The African church that meets downstairs in our building is LOUD. I mean, crazy Hell-fire-and-brimstone loud.
• I have started thinking through travel plans for after the beginning of the year. Very exciting.
• Greetings I have received so far: wave, handshake, head nod, one cheek kiss, 2 cheek kisses, 3 cheek kisses. It is incredibly hard for me to judge what I am supposed to do. Needless to say I have already created some awkward moments.
• The songs/instruments/rhythms of the Arabic music last Sunday made me feel like I was going to church where they were singing flamenco

OK, that's probably enough to give you a taste! I should probably also mention that I have been tasting Moroccan/Turkish/Syrian/Iranian/Iraqi sweet after sweet. Life's not too terrible these days! : )