salamanca

Last night was my last night in Salamanca, Spain. In less than one and a half hours from now I am boarding a bus for Madrid and then tomorrow I board a train bound for Paris. On tuesday the 10th I finally return to the states. In all honesty I don?t really want to leave Salamanca but I guess that I am ready to come home.

To say goodbye to all our friends and to just generally have a good time Jenson and I threw a fairwell dinner party in our apartment. 12 or so people showed up and we cooked a perfect amount of food for all. I have to say that the best thing about living in Spain, in regards to cooking, is the vast amount of inexpensive wines. I picked up a bottle of white vine last night for a euro and it was the best cooking wine it tasted really good. For dinner I made salad, spaghetti, trout, shrimp pasta, curry chicken?and boiled up some shrimp. The meat and fish markets here are freakin? amazing I love them, the meat is incredibly fresh. To drink we went somewhat traditional and had sangria, calimochos and, of course, lots and lots of red wine.

After dinner we all hit the town for one last loop around the bar/club scene here in Salamanca. I am not going to miss it all that much but it was a good time last night.

I better get my butt on the move or I might miss my bus. My next blog will probably be when I am back in the states.

If you met me in Europe and are waiting for me to upload pictures check back in a few days I?ll have them up, honest.

Tonight is my last night in Salamanca, Spain. It has been a freakin? awesome month and I will definitely return to Spain. My roommates, classmates plus a few random people from around town are having a dinner party tonight in our apartment. It should be quite fun.

Tomorrow we are off to Madrid and on Saturday I head out for Paris. Sometime next week I?ll upload all of my pictures and update you all on my trip home.

Until then....

My run yesterday was great! I ran past the city limits of Salamanca and then ran along the border of the town. I can now honestly say that I have ran throughout the entire town of Salamanca out to each of the borders, it took me 4 weeks and I had to run about 3 to 4 times each week but I did it!!! The storm rolled in yesterday right when I began my run but I still ran in it anyways. It was quite fun, the wind provided enough resistance to make my legs ache this morning. The rain came down pretty hard at times and I was drenched within a matter of minutes but like I said it was about 30 when I went running so who cares.

Towards the end of my run I discovered a new park. It is similiar to the park that I have been going to but the grass is greener and all of the equipment is newer in the park (sit up benches, monkey bars, swings, etc. etc.). I went back to the park today to do a workout on the equipment. It is a perfect place to workout because it has a track that leads you to each of the different workout places so you can run, do some exercises, run some more, do more exercises, etc. etc.

In other news. Tonight we are heading out to another concert at Domus Atrium 2002, the same place where we saw The Ladybug Transistor. I think this concert brings my concert count in Spain to 12 or so. There were a few other concerts that I wanted to go to but I missed them for various reasons. Tomorrow night I am heading to a Flamenco concert with a few classmates that should be pretty interesting. Everyone has been telling me that Flamenco concerts are boring but they also said that bullfights were boring and to be honest I kinda liked the bullfight.

I have decided to leave town a day early and head to Madrid for two days. Upon the recommendation of a particular person I have to go to the Prado and a few other museums. Sander, Daniel, Jenson and I are going to head to Madrid on Friday morning and spend the night. Daniel, Jenson and I are all leaving from Madrid bound for different destinations. Daniel is heading back to Holland, Jenson to London and myself to Paris. Sander is staying in Salamanca for another week or two so he?ll be heading back to Salamanca. I may update my blog tomorrow but if not I will update it when I am back in the US, trying to find an internet cafe in Paris is freakin? difficult.

Until next time....?

The current time is 6:20 in the evening here in Salamanca, Spain and we are about to get the first storm of the summer. The clouds have darkened, the wind has picked up and any minute now it is going to start downpouring on us. The temperature is about 30 or 33.

I?m going running!! This is going to be so much fun.

The numbers of days I have left in Spain has hit single digits. This is not good. I am in freakin love with Spain and I do not want to leave. This place is awesome and I could learn so much more spanish if I could stay for another 2, 3 or 4 months. I hate being so dang responsible because in reality there is nothing stopping me from staying several more months except the fact that I have start working, buy a house and become a responsible member of American society.

In other news I uploaded 40 some-odd pictures of Salamanca. It is nowhere near the amount of pictures I have actually taken but it?s difficult uploading pictures here because I do not want to be inside at all.

I would stay in Spain longer BUT I have to get back to America so that I can help vote little boy blue out of the White House.

Yesterday we got 3 new rooms as 3 of our roommates went home.

Before
Irene:Taiwan, Irene is awesome she doesn?t get out much so I?ve been doing my best to get her to go to concerts and other places of interest in Salamanca.
Judith: Holland, Judith was pretty cool. I had classes with her, saw her at home and would frequently run into her and her dutch friends. They were all pretty cool.
David: Sweden. Cool guy, found the rock wall and pool hall in Salamanca. He kicked my butt at chess.
Evanna: Serbia. A really cool gal. We would have interesting talks about Serbia, the US and other countries from around the world. I would only see her at home, the pool and, of course, the discotecas.
Jenson and I

Now
Irene, Jensen and I still remain. Now we have three kids from France that we think are about 16 or so. Their parents dropped them off yesterday, took them grocery shopping and then left them. It is going to be very very interesting living with them. Jensen figures that we can just keep them drunk for the next week and everything will be fine. I?m all for it, at least then maybe they?ll stop running around in the house.

Last night I went to a local concert here in Salamanca, Spain. This time, however, it was more of what I would call a real concert. It was held at a bar by the name of Cafe Destroy, the band was Nuble something or other.

The bar was similiar to a standard bar in the states, it had two section that were only separated by 3 steps down and a hand railing. The band was setup towards the back of the bar on a stage that was situation on the lower section of the bar. The show was slated to start at 11:00 but, like all shows, it really started close to midnight. I arrived at 11pm and noticed a flock of young espa?oles in front of the bar, regardless of my age I went into the bar. Inside I was still one of the oldest people in the crowd but the closer to midnight it got the larger the group of "my people" got. The average age of the teenagers was about approximately 16 (16 is the legal drinking age in Spain) and the average age of those in the 20s was approximately 25. The band members all appeared to be between 17 and 20.

I was thrown back in time when I looked at the band, ok just listen to the description. The drummer was the darkest one of the club with somewhat long dark black hair, he played a standard drum set. The lead guitarist had shoulder length brown hair and played an acoustic guitar. The bass player though, ok pay attention, was pretty white had curly blond hair (was definitely spanish though) and played a blonde Fender P-Bass. What?s more is that the bassist was the most outgoing of the group and slapped his bass like no other, he was pretty talented. The guitarist on the other side was about my height had hair just past his ears, hadn?t shaved in a few days and was somewhat tan but still pretty white. He played an double-humbucker Ibanez guitar with?a Floyd Rose tremolo, locking nuts and painted a sparkly gray. It was pretty interesting to seem them because they honestly looked pretty similiar to Chris, Dale and I.

The crowd was awesome though. A lot of the kids had longer hair, shoulder length or attempting to grow it to shoulder length. They were the standard t-shirt and jeans. I saw a Steve Vai shirt, Led Zeppelin, The Cure and a few other American band shirts mostly bands were traditional rock. In Salamanca it is easy to find a club/bar that is filled with english speakers from Holland, France, England, Taiwan, the US, etc. but there was not a single english speaker in the place. I loved it.

The pre-band music that was played by the DJ was a mix of Spanish music of the rock genre and American classic rock. It was great the DJ played a lot of Zeppelin and the Stones and these kids knew every single word in almost perfect english too (well perfect rock english).

Now for the band. The band hit the stage in the perfect high-school rock band style, dressed in raggidy jeans and t-shirts with a little fog machine at the side of the stage creating a "mysterious" effect. I thought it was awesome. Their first song was pretty slow and contained a lot of acoustic guitar licks, the entire thing (all of their songs) were in Spanish so I had not a clue what they were singing about. They did have quite a nice fan base though all of their friends were singing along to the songs and having a really good time. The band played fairly tightly together but they missed a few beats here and there, overall though they were really good for their age.

After playing a few slow songs they started busting into some faster rock. The bassist started to get warmed up and his finger began to slap and pluck the heck out of his Fender P-Bass. I think he was just having way too much fun up on stage. The guitarist was also decent but he you could tell that he needed to practice a bit, although he was pretty good at tapping, played a nice song that sounded pretty simliar to some old Steve Vai licks.

The best part of the show, however, was the last song. I think they purposely saved that song for last. The band did a cover of the oh-so-traditional Spanish song. You know what I?m talking about... thinking about it.. Here let me help.. Dun---dun-dun-dundundund--(up one note)Dun---dun-dun-dundundun (up one note then down two notes) ba da da dun. repeat a thousand times. If you still don?t have it end your head think of Spain and then think of the first song that comes to your head. The band did a great job at it though and the guitarist played a really nice hard rock slant to it by tapping and bend strings like crazy. The bassist also got into the song by doing his slap thang on his bass, it was pretty good.

The concert ended around 12:45 or so and after that I met up with some friends at the Chupiteria (come?on you spanish speaker figure out what that place sells). I made it home around 2 or so.

Today (Friday) was the last day for many of the student at Colegio De Espa?a and we had a farewall ceremony and presentation of Diplomas for those that are leaving. Next week is going to pretty bare at the school and probably in the town.

Tonight I am meeting up with some friends at 9pm in our piso and then I?m meeting up with another friend at 10pm to go to another Jazz concert. At 12:30 there is a Salsa concert at the local Salsa bar, so that should be fun. Since this is Spain I am about to go take my Siesta so that I can stay out to the normal time of 4:30 to 6am in the morning (last call at most bars is 5:30 or 6am).

Tomorrow, a classmate and I are going to take the bus to Santa Marta for a bullfight, more concerts and a huge fiesta that starts at midnight and lasts until 7am. That should be quite fun.

The Newport Jazz Quartet on Sunday night wasn?t very good but it was still a concert and I did have a bit of fun. In other concert news I have finally found two punk/metal/alternative concerts here in Salamanca. On Thursday night I am going to go see a Portugese alternative metal band from (guess...) Portugal. They are playing at a local underground venue here in Salamanca and I am freakin?excited to finally go see a show. On friday night there is another band playing here in Salamanca at a local bar.

It is getting easier and easier to find show to attend. At each show there is usually a flyer or something advertising for future shows. So far in the past 2 1/2 weeks I have attended about 10 shows and I have 5 more scheduled up to next wednesday. Tonight I am going to a Flamenco show, that should be fun.

In other news..

My sunburn is gone for the most part. I went for another run today but I only did about 4-5k I?m getting lazy. I had a ton of homework to do for tomorrow. In conversation class we are talking about the influence of models and fashion on youth and in my other class I have to present a short story about all the concerts I have been attending. It is quite fun writing stories in Spanish when you can barely create sentences, my stories usually go like this (except in Spanish)

I like music. The concert was great. The singer was very good. I go to many concerts.

and so on and so on.

Welp until next time.....

ayer, fue a la piscina durante seis horas. I am so freakin?burnt. My shoulders are one solid burned mess as well as my back, stomach, face, arms everything except what was covered by my bathing suit. Salamanca has four or five pools and I went to the largest one. They have two waterslides, two water ramps thingies and a shallow pool with two fountains in the middle of it. I had a really good time at the pool yesterday but I am paying for it today, man I?m burnt.

That?s all I wanted to say for today. Talk to ya all later.

Last night Jenson went to the Ray Gelato concert (Jazz en la Calle), it was another great concert put on by the city of Salamanca. Honestly, I could live here this place is simply awesome I love it. There is another concert tonight and I believe it is another Swing band although I am not quite sure because I don?t have the schedule in front of me.

This morning Jenson, Irene and I went out to the big city market. If you have ever been to a flea market in California it was just like that except with a huge emphasis on clothing and less emphasis on electronics and other items. The market was ok, nothing to write home about though (oh wait I just did). After walking around the market for an hour or two I headed over to the local pool which was across the street. Jenson was to lame to go to the pool, he opted instead to watch the Tour de France on TV; lame.

The pool is awesome. The have two waterslides, two small water ramp thingies and a shallow pool with two fountains that is perfect for laying around in. I stayed at the pool from 1pm until 6:30pm or so before I left. I?m a bit burnt, oh well.

Tonight

Newport Jazz Quarter, Jazz en la Calle. 10:30. These things are so much fun.

I still have not had a chance to upload any picture but I will spend some time here at the internet cafe later this week and attempt to upload them. Although you may just have to wait until I get back to the states. Internet cafes are everywhere but getting my USB to work has been quite a pain in most places due to security restrictions on the computers.

Until my next entry... I have to get to my homework now.