where do i begin?

Dear friends and family--

I will begin with an apology for being so neglectful in keeping you up to date. As it turns out, I hardly have time to brush my teeth while traveling, much less find a computer and organize my thoughts into an open diary.

And now I REALLY don´t feel like doing this, because how could I possibly sum it all up? Let´s see, where did I leave off?...

So I arrived to Paris on Christmas day, which was sort of disorienting not only because of the holiday, but because I hadn´t realized until I stepped foot outside the airport that there is one very large language barrier between the French and myself. I guess I had grown accustomed to being in Europe and easily communicating, but that is because I hadn´t yet left Spain. Nicole was in a town outside of Paris celebrating Christmas with a French friend she knows from Sevilla, so I had about 6 hours to kill. Of course, it took me nearly 3 to figure out how to get to the center of the city, and once that was done I was happy to find that all the bars and cafes were open. Once Nicole came back to Paris, we had a lovely home cooked dinner at our friends´ apartment, which we had to ourselves, the three French roommates all at their respective homes. The next day was filled with touristy things like going to the Eiffel Tower and eating crepes on the street. Later on in the evening we hopped on a bus to Antwerp, where we ended up staying that night and the next day. This is a long story that I won´t go into, because we had never planned on going to Belgium. But there we were, in the center of chilly Antwerp ice skating! The only thing I really knew about Antwerp beforehand was that it was an industrial city, so I was not expecting it to be so beautiful. I have to admit, it was a nice little pitstop before heading into Holland..

Which is what we did the next day. Nicole has two friends from Sevilla who are from a town called (for short) Den Bosch, about an hour outside of Amsterdam. These two happy Dutchmen, Bart and Pieter, home for the holidays, picked us up from Antwerp on the 27th and brought us to their wonderfully charming town. We were so lucky to have this experience, as it seems that most of Holland is quite different than Amsterdam, which was become a hugely international city. Den Bosch was the most quaint, picturesque little town, while at the same time very posh with trendy restaurants, bars and shops. After eating a giant meal of "snacks" (Dutch fast food--never again), we went to our first coffee shop, where we shared our first legal joint with Bart and Pieter :) We then headed to Cafe Cordes, the bar Bart works in (aka Bart´s Bar)--where I literally felt like I could have been in San Francisco. It was sort of a hipster scene, except waaaaay cooler, with an incredible DJ. We realized on this very night that the Dutch like to drink A LOT. They also like to buy each other drinks. Because Bart worked at the bar, we were drinking free all night. But people still insisted on buying all 4 of us drinks, just for the joy of it. Sometimes I would run into Bart holding 3 beers between 2 hands, just because he was so loved.

Okay, that´s all you get for now because I have to go soon, and I would like to recap what´s been going on since I´ve been home, because it´s been an awesome couple of days...

Yesterday was Dia de los Reyes, which is basically Spain´s Christmas--when all the gifting goes down. I really like this idea for several reasons, the first being that it extends the holiday season for a whole week. Secondly, I like how it actually ties the whole gift thing in with what we are actually celebrating during the holiday season. Who the hell is Santa Claus, and where did he come from? The three wise kings, however, have a written history, and of course they probably would have brought the gifts on the actual day Jesus was born if they had had flying reindeer and a sled. But, back in those days a camel back is as good as it gets, so they were a little late for the holy celebration.

Anyway, the best part of all this is that I live in a house with children, and thus it is a very exciting day. Alex has been trying to get to the bottom of the Santa Claus (my cousins are lucky--they get BOTH) and Reyes mystery---do they exist? We have sort of decided that he knows what´s up, but thinks that if he admits it, he won´t get any presents. He still asks though, and we still lie.

On "Reyes eve", Alex never got dressed. His excitement was at such a high level that all he could do was wait until it was time to get back in bed and wake up to a new day. Something about this small detail, that of Alex being in his PJs all day, changed him into a new person. Or rather, a younger person. He is a very cool 1o year old, not like most boys at his age who tend to be quite obnoxious. But that day--he reverted back to his infancy, driving everyone nuts. Especially Pilar, who had come down with a cold and was not in the mood to put up with his shenanigans (at one point, because he would not leave the room where Isabela and I were preparing his gift, she had to drag him out by the ankles).

So that night, once it was all quiet, I heard Pilar going down the stairs. Then I heard her open the front door, and without shutting it, push the unlock button on the keypad to the car, sounding it in the small carport attatched to the house. Then I heard her open the trunk and drag in sevearl noisy plastic bags. The front door is adjacent to the staircase, which leads right into all four bedrooms upstairs. It was loud. I quietly chuckled to myself, and went downstairs to help out, thinking--"There is no way Alex doesn´t know".

The next morning all the family came over, and all the cousins received their gifts from the Reyes while the adults exchanged "amigo invisible" gifts. I had Mario, Pilar´s sister Maria´s boyfriends, and because he only wrote "sorpresas" in the wish list book, that is what he got--many surprises from my trip. I think he enjoyed them. Pilar was my amigo invisible, and she gave me some warm clothes, because it´s far colder than I had imagined here, as well as some nicely scented warm pillow things. I will be cozy this winter. For lunch, we ate a meal called Gachas, which Pilar´s father Dimas made as it comes from his town in Toledo. It is basically like a flour puree that you dip bread and meat in. It comes in a giant bowl, and nobody has plates, because everyone is dipping from this giant bowl. Apparently it is a peasant meal, but it´s delicious so we eat it anyway.

Ahh gotta go! Vacation update part two coming up. And..PHOTOS!