brad@anize

Granada-Capileira-Sevilla

Goodbye Granada (for now), wow Alpujarra and Feria or Bed in Sevilla or Seville.
24.4.04 14:32 another farewell party
24.4.04 14:11 Sal�t Lady B
24.4.04 14:20 free spanish classes
26.4.04 20:45 Tranquilo en las Alpujarras
27.4.04 22:00 wasted day
28.4.04 20:09 Feria in Sevilla
2.5.04 15:00 Crook

24.4.04 14:32 another farewell party
Last night was cool. Farewelled crook Nadia & Tereza with an afternoon coffee & tinto. Internetted & the Finns were starting out at the flat. We must have got out around 1. Melanie & Oscar came back to Duo which was sweet. Finally finished the �5 Camera film. Will be fun getting developed. Mel Z: Wenn ich bis ende Mai dir kein CD geschickt habe, erinnere mich daran. Tuure’s mates leaving 2pm & drank like their last night. Ari & I got back after 6. Got to know Vanessa & Jan�t(sp?)-yet more fun, interesting people.
24.4.04 14:11 Sal�t Lady B
Man that was funny. I woke up hearing Lady B cleaning up the living room after last night (good: we don’t have to). I packed & put my bags out. Resting on the couch my plan is to wake, shower & maybe breakfast when Ari wakes. Instead, something like:
LB:”When you leaving?”
B:”Dunno exactly. Some time this arvo.”
LB:”You must leave at 12”
B:”sure” (watch says 12ish)
LB:”You must leave at 12”
B:”? I’ve left the room???”
LB:”You must leave. To the street”
B:”I don’t understand”
LB:”yes you understand”
B:”I must leave the appartment? I don’t understand! Why?”
LB:”You must leave at 12. You only pay until 12”
B:”I am out of the room, the room is cleanable, its no problem”
LB:”its not a problem for you, its a problem for me.”
B:”why?”
LB:…nonsense “it should look nice”
B:”!!! I’ve been here 3 weeks, nobody new is here now, there’s no reason why you need my stuff gone now”
repeat… B:”I don’t understand this. Its crazy!”
LB:”Go!”
B(getting nowhere & realising there’s nothing new to understand. in English):”forget it”
LB:”I’ll call the police”
B(I had to laugh at the idea):”call”
She called her daughter & came back for more whingeing. Around now I started feeling sorry for her if she has nothing better to do. After at least 30mins, Ari must’ve woken. He has far more spanish.
45 minutes later we weren’t much the wiser. There was absolutely nothing for her to gain from the whole fuss. She had her money & wasn’t getting more. She whinged that I’d paid too little (every cent was agreed beforehand), that a weekly price is 6 days not 7 (the school already got paid a day extra since normal price is arrive Sun leave Sat. We were fully in placate mode. She whinged all sorts. Eventually Ari asked blatantly what she wants. Me to leave. We had a conference…asked if showering & getting my stuff from the kitcheh was ok if I left straight after. Ok but rapido. So I did. The end result was I left 75 mins later than I otherwise would have :)
Now drinking a fanta & figuring out where to go. Will head to the bus station & see whats convenient. Currently favouring Alpujarras (�rgiva, Pampaneira, Bubi�n, Capileira) or the beach rather than the direction Jaen, Cordoba, Sevilla. Get out of a city for a bit. Maybe get a place in Sevilla for a month ~May.
24.4.04 14:20 free spanish classes
Gustav gave me some sweet info yesterday. The place where they teach language teachers needs guinea-pig pupils and offer classes for free. Great Idea! In Granada they have classes starting in June. Other places probably have the same deal: go look for it.
The last few weeks have been way too expensive for long-term travel, where money=time. I guess I’ve gotten used to short jaunts from Munich & spanish school wasn’t cheap. Now I can hopefully learn more on my own & later in summer or perhaps even in South America try this out. Speaking of S.A. Vanessa mentioned family contacts in Peru (Lima and I think somewhere else).
26.4.04 20:45 Tranquilo en las Alpujarras
The Alpujarras are a sensational destination, although I recommend visiting soonish before it loses some of its charm due to growing tourism and foreign ownership. Geographically, its a region on the other side of the Sierra Nevada mountains from where I was at Wednesday. Squeezed between 3400m and the sea are winding roads, gorges, terraced slopes and towns full of traditional, square, white plastered, clay roofed buildings with distinctive chimneys. Alpujarra’s higher reaches are a national park, full of wildlife. I’ve seen a couple eagles soaring overhead and there’s supposed to be vultures around. If the conditions are right, you can see Morocco’s Atlas mountains. I don’t recall seeing the stars this clearly anywhere in Europe (inc. Alps, Norway or Sweden). If you like hiking, rock climbing, horse riding, mountain biking or driving slaloms, you should be ok here. You can sit in front of a fireplace with wine or on a sunny terrace with locally produced, natural tasting food & a beer. Its better with a vehicle.
So how did I get here? Saturday I made it to Capileira, since my bus destination Bubi�n didn’t have any affordable beds free. I was rather pleased to find Capileira was celebrating its annual fiesta & the unadvertised campsite had a �11 bed going (thanks to the anon. english couple for the ride). An overdue siesta was replaced with a 2hr conversation with the rather spiritual Nieves. To be more precise…a 1/2hr conversation which currently takes 4 times as long and a lot of patience. Some Spanish guests then shared dinner they’d brought and it was fiesta time. Typical small town bash, especially the barn dance…which still reminded me of Pingelly although the music was a lot different, every baby, kid, teenager right through to pensioner was out past 3am and I didn’t see a keg. I was exhausted.
Recovery sleep & Sunday a lazy day which started by repairing bits of the hosts ill Windows ME PC & then lunch & spanish in the sun. I came back just as Peter was going up the road/track with paraglider Carlos to bring the car down. Sweet. After that there was nothing to do except lie in the sun and read. Bring deck chairs. After Pizza, we went back up the track to see the stars away from the village lights. Awesome. On the drive down, we pulled over to watch some fiesta fireworks going off below.
Today was more tranquilo. Went up into the national park, then lunched and had one of those ‘only when you travel’ conversations with the nice neighbouring table Flemish couple (Antwerp). After walking to Pampaneira & back Luis made Tortilla & its time to diarize & read. The fire crackles and 6 month old campsite dog (Coco/Loco) next to me agrees its couch time.
27.4.04 22:00 wasted day
Oops - the last bus from Orgiva to the beach leaves 8something am. This is bad considering I got up at 9 and was planning on getting there in the afternoon. While grabbing lunch and hatching a plan (to get to either another Alpujarra town or the beach depending on where I could get a ride to…and from there to Seville in the next couple days) Jessica oferred a ride from here to Seville tomorrow. Easy…but cancelled, so I’ll be on that early bus. These things happen when you go with the flow.
28.4.04 20:09 Feria in Sevilla
Sevilla/Seville depends on language: don’t be surprised to see both spellings. Regardless how I spell it, I’ve arrived. Its ”feria” time, the spring festival described as ‘Andalusia celebrates for a week its love of horses, music & beautiful women’. I’m looking forward to it, walking from the bus station, I saw plenty of the last in fancy bright dresses. Apparently Sherry is the drink of choice. Meeting Stephane and the frisbee crew later.
On a different note, I finally finished ”Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” on the bus. A very impressive book, probably not for everyone, but there’s a lot in there to think about and plenty of quotables.
2.5.04 15:00 Crook
Feria was good, but I haven’t seen any of it since the first night. Been not very well in bed and now losing my voice, but hey, I got to read, Zen & Motorcycles again. I’m about to print out my insurance certificate and claim form… something I should have done before I needed them :) Soon to be read here - “how farmacies in Spain simply give out Antibiotics without a doctor or proper instructions on how to use them”. You heard it here first.