Blacken the Skies

It has been nearly four days here. Things have gone extremely well. The only thing that has been pretty difficult, however, is technological communication. You know, like phones, computers, telegraphs, etc. We have had plenty of face-to-face glee. In fact, there has yet to be a night that we are in earlier than 2am.

Let's try to start this off in some sort of order since I have been so neglectful lately. I arrived in Madrid. I had to wait about 7 hours in the airport for Nino to arrive later in the evening. I was laying in a corner with my backpack fighting sleep. At this time, I hadn't slept for about 24 hours. Eventually, he came in at 10pm. We took a bus out to Alcala where we were to be staying with a rad dude named Mikel. He happens to be Basque. This virgin journey was not one that came without hardship. We ended up lost a bit and were lucky enough to stumble upon a woman from England. She leant us a cell phone to call Mikel. We later found out that she has been living here for 10 years to study the Franco lists of exile. Crazy cool.

Anyways, before I continue Spanish Civil War nerding-out, let's get back to the trip. We slept only two hours that night, and woke up the next morning to go see the painting of Guernica by Pablo Picasso. Then, we headed over to Segovia to see some sights from the book For Whom the Bell Tolls. It was an awesome of history. Finally, we ended up at a club with Mikel's roomate. He was encouraging us to practice our lady skills. I went for it for shits and giggles. I made quite the spectacle of myself after my solid pronunciation proved as quite an evasion. After the initial "como te llamas?", I am usually toast. It was a good time though and a funny thing to attempt. Can't get anymore superficial than not even being able to speak the same language.

The next day, we tripped down to Sevilla. We had to wait about 6 hours between the time we got to the station and the time we left because the trains were full. In the meantime, I painted a bit in front of the famous art gallery, Prado. Nino serenaded the streets with the ukulele. When we were at the train station, we were approached by a girl who invited us to her beach house in Valencia. Se gave us her phone number in email. We contacted her about going down to see the city, and she responded that she could not have us over because she would be back in Madrid. We have now come to find that she is an actress, Iris Lezcano. In what twisted universe do beautiful actresses approach smelly dudes with backpacks in a train station?

I finally figured out what I love so much about the city of Sevilla. To me, it is the perfect combination of urban culture and historical tradition. Throw some ancient buildings on top of some crustees, skate parks, and antifa grafitti; I am in heaven.

In Madrid, we stayed with two gals named Clara and Daniela. They are friends of a dude I met when I was down here last time named Pedro. He plays in a doom band called Monkeypriest. Last time I was here, I was searching for a place called La Carboneria. They offer free flamenco there. After searching for 2 hours, I came accross a show with a Canadian sludge band called Nadja. Pedro happened to be playing there as well. The funny thing is that this time, they took us to La Carboneria on an evening out. We were able to watch a great show of flamenco with toms of good friends. Later, we ventured to the place where I originally saw Pedro's band: Utopia. It was quite the case of Deja Vu.

We had a very typical Spanish night out. We set our time for 10pm, but we didn't make it out until about 1230am. We meandered around the streets and corridors picking up different friends along the way. Finally, we ended the night at a black metal bar (which name I cannot pronounce). We drank some drink called a "Hate Legion" while it was set ablaze by the bartender. Terrorizer was playing in the background. It was so metal.

The kids there are really cool. They love their music too. We ate dinner together while listening to In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. I made a dish which can now be officially branded as "Punk Paella". It is very simple. Just throw whatever you have in the fridge over some tomato sauce, and serve it over rice. It was a huge hit. A lot of sauce and garlic of course! We hope to keep in close contact with all of the Sevilla kids. They are a great group and showed us a very fun time.

Currently, there is a very interesting situation happening in Sevilla with the squat, Fabrica De Sombreros. On the tuesday before we came, the police came to evict the kids from the house. There was a huge manifestation in the streets. The house was used as what we would consider in America as a "free school". Now, it just sits as nothing. The government was supposed to grant it to the public as a public building, but now they are taking an offer from a private buyer. I tried t get more information from the Anarchist book shop near by, but it was closed for Sunday. But hopefully the internet resources suffice.

Finally, we left Sevilla, and today arrived in Cordoba. The trip over was a proof of how small of a world we live in. We met a lady on the train who is from Spain, but used to live in Chino Hills. She later introduced us to her 7 friends when the train arrived at the station (keep in mind that is 16 kisses from Spanish women in total right there). Anyways, they were greeted by a gal who is from america named Kira. She happens to be teaching here, and knows Brittany (the girl we are with now). Brittany is from LA, and she is here in Cordoba to teach English. The world is just too small.