Encouragement

I finished my fourth week of intensive language classes!  And to be honest, I just feel like I have tons of information floating around in my brain and little to no ability to use it accurately or effectively.

This afternoon I was wandering aimlessly around the house trying to decide what to do with the couple of hours I had before meeting with my language exchange partner.  My brain was/is fried enough that it needed a break from studying - so that was out. Fortunately, a neat friend had sent this book with some neat visitors that came to Madrid this week!  Also fortunately, Nikki was there to suggest that I go read it for a while.

My Life in France by Julia Child
with Alex Prud'homme

Briefly, one thing that's important to know is that Julia Child is one of my absolute culinary heroes.  When I end up involved in a game of "If you could talk to any famous person, living or dead, who would you choose?"  My answer: Julia Child.

Anyways, I was reading and trying to banish frustrations with language study when I came across this.

"The longer I was in Paris, the worse my French seemed to get.  I had gotten over my initial astonishment that anyone could understand what I said at all.  But I loathed my gauche accent, my impoverished phraseology, my inability to communicate in any but the most rudimentary way."

Yay!!  Exactly!!  Why is that encouraging, you may be asking yourself?  Because eventually, Julia did learn to speak French fluently and then she ended up changing the culinary world.  So, maybe I can eventually learn Spanish :).

Then I went to meet my language exchange partner, whom I haven't seen in about six weeks.  We started chatting, and she was pretty shocked.  Her words "Stacy, your Spanish speaking has improved so much!"

So, you know, apparently things are going better than I thought they were!  And that's a nice way to begin the weekend, wouldn't you say? :)

Random Experiences

Since I've mostly been in class or studying somewhere the last couple of weeks, I haven't really thought of much to blog about.  That is, unless you're interested in Spanish grammar, vocab, and verb tenses.  Anyone??  No?  Hmm...  :)

And to be completely honest with you, I'm blogging right now because I seem to have developed an aversion to studying irregular verbs.  And that's kind of what I need to be studying right now.  Ok, one blog post - then I'll focus on irregular verbs - I promise!

Anyways, after intentionally deciding that I had zero desire to carry my umbrella around this afternoon, I found myself taking shelter from a  massive downpour.

When trapped by a downpour, the recommended course of action is
to take a picture.

As I cuddled next to the building and waited for the rain to lay off, I realized that I probably had enough randomly interesting experiences for a blog post.  Neat eh?
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So on Saturday, Nikki was able to convince me to join her in walking down to the La Latina and Lavapiés neighborhoods.  After buying tortillas in Lavapiés for taco night, we discovered where all of the Indian food stands were set up for the Bollywood festival.  This resulted in a great deal of excitement, as you might imagine :).

A plaza full of Indian food stands.

Too bad I had already eaten lunch...

But, I had room for a couple snacks and some dessert :).

On Sunday, I was finishing some cleaning when Nikki came in and said that our plaza was full of motorcycles!  I found this to be quite exciting news, because I sometimes miss having a bike.

My former bike...

So Erin and I headed out to admire the bikes in the plaza.  Then I studied a bit before heading to tutoring.

Harleys parked in the plaza.

How great is this one with a horse and a buffalo painted on it?

There you go :).  And now I think I'll take on some of those irregular verbs, because I'm probably going to need them.  Later!

Signs of the Protest

Camp Sol Manifesto

"The sleeping voice of the people has awoken"
or something like that...

"In Sol we trust"

"We have the right to dream and make it a reality"

"We are more"

Protesters in Sol

It is interesting how things change sometimes isn't it?  The last post I put on this blog was about a kind of fun little parade in Puerta del Sol.  Now, it looks like Spain is all over the international news because of a protest that started in Sol, spread through the country, and continues right now.

I don't think I'll go into depth here on what this is about, the history behind it, or my personal opinion.  But, the basic premise is grounded in the fact that there are a lot of frustrated, unemployed people (especially youth) in Spain and they are extremely concerned about the future.

I'm sure you can find news on this all over but here's a BBC article and one with a video by the protesters. This protest has been declared illegal, but the police are currently not planning to break it up unless it gets unruly.

Anyways, it's obviously impossible for me to avoid going and checking this kind of stuff out :).  So, I went down there this afternoon.  Puerta del Sol definitely looks different today than it did the last time I blogged.

Part of the camp in Sol

One of the Metro entrances

The bear and tree statue, symbol of Madrid

Protestors and tourists

When you're busy protesting,
the best place to wash your feet is in the fountain

Police riot vans lined up

The foodie in me loves that they're
making paella while protesting :)

There were also quite a few signs up around Sol.  Maybe I'll put some of those in a different blog post so this one doesn't get any longer.

I think it will be interesting to see what comes of this.  The elections are tomorrow (Sunday), but the protesters are planning to stay for as long as it takes.

Kickoff to the San Isidro Festival

May 11-15 is the San Isidro festival in Madrid.  Other than knowing that San Isidro is Madrid's patron saint and having found this extensive schedule of events, I am not sure what the details are regarding this festival.  But, I was able to catch the kickoff parade in Sol this evening - it was a little bit different :).  I've never seen dancing giants before...

A few of the gigantes making their way into Sol.

A cabezudo walked right by me, so he got his picture taken :).

The gigantes men lined up to do a dance.

The gigantes women lined up to dance.

I think I surprised him...

A few members of one of the bands taking a break.

Right before those of us taking photos were shooed
out so they could begin the dance.

And here's the dance footage.  Enjoy :).

Roses

Just thought you would all like to know that the roses are blooming in the palace gardens.  They're pretty amazing :).

Tunes

As you may recall from some of my previous posts, it's been a battle to really get into a focused "zone" while studying Spanish.  Probably some of that is just my rusty study habits that were pretty much shelved after I was handed my degree however many years ago - ten(ish)?  Wow.

Anyways, I'm not sure what the difference is from the focus level I was able to achieve working on projects in the corporate world compared to studying a second language.  It's as if I've had to learn how to enter the "zone" all over again.  I won't bore you with the details, but the bottom line is that is seems to be coming along - which is encouraging.

Ok, I'll give you one detail - since it was originally the goal of this post :).  About a month ago, my tutor gave me a CD - to help me study Spanish :).  It turned out to be classic Spanish guitar music.

Now, I focus/study best when it's quiet.  Which is, for the most part, an unrealistic expectation in a city this large.  So, the next most effective option is to listen to classical music while studying - no words distracting me, good to go :).

And I recently heard about this guy (below).  He's apparently a pretty big deal in the classical guitar world as well.

I guess my tutor was right :).  Anyways, it's nice to be able to focus when studying since it directly affects my ability to speak, comprehend, and read.  So, thanks for praying for that - if you have been :).