El día de los reyes

Now that the holidays are past, and it is back to ¨normal life¨ (...we´re still in Spain, still only working part-time, still spending most of our time studying whatever we want to learn... so it´s not exactly ¨normal life¨ but the fiestas de navidad have come to an end ;) we have been reflecting on some of the delightful experiences we got to share this Christmas.

One difference that I find fascinating is that the Church calendar is so mainstream here: public holidays and festivities coincide with church festivals. And, according to the Church calendar, Christmas starts on Dec.25th and continues until Jan.6th (Epiphany / el día de los reyes). Of course, there are people in Canada who follow this calendar (many of you who are reading this blog, in fact), but there is a different feeling in the air when EVERYONE is on the same page. 

Throughout all 12 days of Christmas (because there literally are 12 days from the 25th to the 6th) there was such a festive atmosphere in the city. And not just people trying to hold on to Christmas a little longer, but the complete understanding that Christmas obviously doesn´t end until the Day of the Kings. No one takes down their decorations, everyone keeps singing villancicos, and no business, school, or university resumes normal hours until after Jan.6th. 

And then on Jan.5th, the final celebrations of Christmas begin to welcome the 3 kings who arrive with presents not only for baby Jesus, but for ALL of the children.

We had the opportunity to go with friends to a celebration at a small convent here in town. Every year a community group prepares a surprise presentation for the nuns, including a play with carols. The play (which many children took part in) was delightful with a very animated retelling of the Christmas story which especially emphasized, of course, the arrival of the 3 kings with their gifts. As the kings entered they showered the crowd with candies and caramels (we were a pretty packed crowd as it is a small space) and then the children (and even some adults) had the chance to sit on a king´s knee and ask for what they wanted for Christmas.

After the kings left (explaining that they needed to go take a siesta before the parade and their very busy night ahead of delivering gifts to all of the children in Spain), everyone squeezed into the dining room to share in a potluck lunch/comida, and then more carols/villancicos. The nuns requested carols in different languages from all of the foreign students, and so Nathan and I sang one or two in English, a friend from Poland sang one of her favorites, and then we all joined in many more in Spanish.

After that celebration we went to a mass, and then to the Cabalgata, which is a massive parade that it seems the whole city turns out for, followed by fireworks, and a dinner among our friends. And then, just as we finished supper, the local neighborhood parade of kings, surrounded by a fairly impressive brass marching band, marched right down our street! So cool! With the crowds at the Cabalgata we had to watch from a distance, but from our third floor balcony we had a perfect view of the local Realejo parade :)

And with that final parade, that finished off our Christmas celebrations :) 

While we certainly missed spending the holidays with our families and friends in Canada and the US along with some of the beautiful traditions that we normally participate in at home, a Spanish Christmas was definitely worth experiencing. :)

We hope you are all keeping well and are refreshed and looking forward to all things to come in this new year!

Love,

Candyce (and Nathan)

Some Holiday Photos:

Advent Wreath :)

City Street Decorations

City Decorations

Nathan´s birthday cake

(Chocolate Black Bean brownie Cake, with Raspberry Filling and Avocado Fudge Icing)

The church where we went to a mass on Jan.5th

La Cabalgata Parade

A better view from higher up...

More fun at the Cabalgata :)

The parade in our street!

View of the snowy Sierra Nevada from the terraza of a friend´s place :)

¡Feliz año nuevo!

Happy New Year! Can you believe it is 2014 already?!? As of Saturday we will have been in Spain for 3 full months - in some ways I feel like we´ve been here much longer and in other ways like we just arrived.

We had a delightful gathering last night to ring in the new year. Several friends came over to have supper at our place (menu including all-the-vegetables-in-the-fridge soup, mexican chili chicken, pomegranate spinach salad, ginger snaps and black bean brownies) and then we joined the crowds downtown to eat 12 grapes, watch the fireworks, and cheer and laugh and take photos.

12 grapes. Have you heard of that tradition? We´ve been told that it originated one year when there was a surplus of grapes in Spain and someone had the brilliant idea to convince everyone that when the clock strikes 12, at each ringing of the bell, you must eat a grape and make a wish. Whenever we ask anyone about their Christmas and New Year´s traditions, they always mention the grapes, and frequently emphasize how stressful it can be to eat them, especially if you have large grapes with seeds... So we diligently were prepared with our 12 grapes, pre-counted and even de-seeded, before we joined the crowds. 

In the end it was fairly chaotic, and we weren´t actually sure if we were eating the grapes during the countdown to 12-midnight, or if the clock had already struck 12... (we couldn´t actually see the clock from our place in the crowd and there was a lot of noise from so many people), but I think that was half the fun. Either way, we have now officially participated in the grape eating tradition, which is obviously very important ;)

After the fireworks we went home for champagne, Dixit, more desserts, chocolate caliente, and much laughter. Although our party didn´t last the whole night (apparently it is very traditional here to stay out or at least awake until after breakfast on Jan.1st), we did stay up until 4am, which is respectable I guess... ;)

And now the second quarter of our year abroad begins!

Some amusing expressions that had us laughing last night were:

Cuatro gatos

Literally: four cats. 

This is one of our favourite expressions, especially as one of our mexican friends uses this all the time (in part I think because Nathan always laughs whenever she says it). If you say there were only 4 cats it means that there was no one there. If you say we were four cats, it means we were the only people there. Or that there was practically nothing happening with no one around.

Nada que ver con la navidad

Literally: that has nothing to do with Christmas. 

It is an expression that can be used when you want to say that something is completely irrelevant, when it has nothing to do with whatever the main focus of the conversation/argument/whatever you are doing. It is similar to the expression ¨And what does that have to do with the price of tea in China?¨ If you are familiar with the game Dixit, this is a useful expression to say when someone plays a card that appears to have nothing to do with the story that has been told. :)

Para gustos, colores

Literally: for tastes, colours. 

This expression is more beautiful than comical as it is a lovely way of saying that for the infinite variety of colors/options/combinations that exist in the world for someone somewhere it is perfect. A little bit like ¨to each his own¨, or ¨different strokes for different folks¨ but lovelier.

Wishing you all many blessings and many colours in 2014!

Love,

Candyce

Diciembre

Hello! I guess it has been a while since my last blog update!
We are continuing to enjoy our time here in Granada (despite contending with a seasonal cold or two...) and I wanted to update you all with a few highlights of this month :)

Las Alpujarras
We went on a little bike trip to the Alpujarras (a mountain range nearby) at the invitation of a new friend, Fran, who is a journalist in Madrid. He was in the midst of filming a cycle-tourism pilot tv show, and wanted to have a few companions along. (Our tandem might make an appearance in the pilot, who knows?)

Our destination was Pampaneira. I had been there once before, but had gone by bus. And let me say, it was MUCH more fun to go by bicycle. The roads in the Alpujarras are very steep and they slowly wind up the sides of the valleys to reach little villages that are perched high on the edges of the valley. In a bus this is a perfect storm for the worst motion-sickness you can ever experience.... (see: switchbacks and pinturns for 2 hours) but on a bike it is fantastic! Yes, it was still steep, but as the road is right on the edge of the valley the incredible views more than make up for it. And even the roads themselves were in perfect condition. It was as if they had been paved just before our visit, plus at this time of year there is very little traffic :)

Audition News

Some other exciting news is that Nathan had success with an audition for a choir project in Germany! The news came on Nathan's birthday, which was fun :) It is a three week project that starts at the end of February. The rehearsals will be in English and German so he will also have the chance to practice a little of his German as well :) He is definitely looking forward to the project.

Villancicos

Every year my friend/colleague Joaquín hosts a Christmas party for children. All of his friends who have kids come together and hear a creative re-telling of the Christmas story, followed by Christmas carols and lots of food and candy. Even though we don´t have children, we were invited :)

It was very cool to listen to the Christmas story with all the drama and mystery that Joaquín and several other parents wove into it. The only light was by candlelight, there were sound affects, music, and pictures projected on the wall at key moments. The 15 or so little ones seated on the floor were mesmerized (well, other than for a few VERY young ones who were more intent on putting keys, instruments, and anything else they could find into their mouths rather than listening to a story).

The Christmas carol portion of the evening was fascinating, as the ¨villancicos¨ that they have here are very different from what we usually sing in Canada. There are a few that overlap, but not many, and even the style of singing is quite different. We are, afterall, in the south of Spain, the heart of Flamenco country, and you can really hear how influential it is when people get together and sing! Not only do the villancicos have some of the same rhythm and harmonies, but the style of singing is also more like flamenco than anything else. One of my favorites was "Los peces en el rio" (you can listen to a version by the Gypsy Kings here, lyrics here). The Gypsy Kings version will give you a good taste of the flamenco-style singing I am talking about.

Posada Mexicana

One of our good friends, who also hosted the Día de los Muertos party in November, hosted a mexican posada party the other night. In Mexico there are 8 or 9 nights of these celebrations leading up to Christmas Eve. The evening starts off with a villancico of the dialogue between Joseph & Mary, and the Innkeeper (Please give us shelter - No I don´t have room - Please, my wife is pregnant - No, go away or I´ll beat you with a stick - Wait, you don´t understand, my wife is Mary and is going to give birth to the savior of the word - Oh! I didn´t realize! Of course, please come in!*) *Note: very loose translation...

The guests of the party divide into two groups to sing the song, and once everyone in the Joseph & Mary group have been invited in, everyone drinks ponche (which is like hot apple cider but with many different kinds of fruit) and eats snacks. And then it is time for the piñata/s!

When Luke and I spent a Christmas (way back when) in Mexico, we got to go to several posadas and they were absolutely one of my favorite highlights of our trip. And although that was a long time ago, I obviously still have strong memorizes as the instant someone yelled "Dale!" (hit it!) I suddenly remembered the song you're supposed to sing while someone tries to hit the piñata. Loli laughed when she heard me singing it because she had forgotten to teach that to everyone before starting. With the singing, yelling of instructions, and sticks and piñata flailing about in the air, it was just the right amount of chaos :)

Christmas Plans

We are very fortunate to have many invitations to various dinners over the holidays. For Christmas Eve we will be spending the evening with several other students who are also not home for the holidays. Christmas Day we have been invited over to join in a friend's family dinner and then we have several other invitations for various occasions. The only downer is that we are both still fighting the tail end of a cold, and so also trying to get as much sleep as possible as well!

I hope you are all doing well. Wishing you many blessings of health, joy and peace during this beautiful time of year.

Blessings,

Candyce

Me cortaron mal el pelo

Today a collection of amusing moments:

Quality of Sound
We continue to be very dedicated to speaking in Spanish all the time, even with just each other. Sometimes this means it takes two or three tries to get our meaning across clearly, but after two months of practice we have made enormous progress so we know in the long-run it will be worth the effort. :)

However, our current level of fluency doesn´t always have the speed we would like. This can lead to some hilarious, if somewhat misadventurous moments. For example, today I was reviewing some vocabulary through Quizlet (an awesome online vocab study tool, btw) which has a particular tool that reads vocab out loud so that you can type what you hear. This was helpful for me, but distracting for Nathan.
No problem, I thought. I´ll wear headphones.
So I popped the headphones in, plugged them in and suddenly the next word resounded in my ears with such force that I almost fell off my chair.... I forgot that while my computer speakers are poor (and I therefore have the volume cranked all the way up, pretty much all the time), our headphones are actually of a fairly high caliber... And as such, the volume was about 9 settings too high...

Nathan, meanwhile, witnessed the whole event and tried to warn me, but in the few seconds he had between the plugging in of the headphones and the next vocab word sounding, the translation of ¨Wait! Turn the volume down first!¨ didn´t quite make it out in time...

Eventually we hope to reach a point where even in time sensitive situations we can find words quickly!

Haircut Research
Even after you can communicate fairly fluently on a basic level, there are always so many more specific words to learn. The other day I decided it was time to learn some hairdressing vocabulary (in preparation for a haircut). How does one say ¨sideswept bangs¨ for example? Or ¨textured layers¨? Having never had a haircut in Spain before, these words were not yet part of my vocabulary.

With an interest in avoiding a strange or random haircut due to miscommunication, I did some research and now have all the words I need (hopefully). Along the way, I also found an article that pointed me to this video, which I found quite hilarious. Hopefully I will end up better off than the singer did with his haircut.

Acento Andalu(z)
Last weekend Nathan went on a hike organized by the Campus Ministry group. It is always interesting to listen to the variety of accents in that group, as many students who participate are Erasmus students (which means they are on their required year abroad of their undergrad) from many different European countries. However, on this particular outing there were mostly local students, which meant the predominant accent was Andalusian.

The acento andaluz can be a bit hard to understand for foreigners. They speak very rapidly and they ¨eat¨ many of their consonants. This is especially true with ´s´, ´z´, and ´d´ and most endings of words. (For this reason, it is always referred to as ¨el acento andalu´, not ¨el acento andaluz¨ because that ´z´ is dropped)

Nathan, with his singer´s ear (and more importantly, his singer´s experience of studying, practicing, and mimicking vowels in many different languages), got to listen to and practice the acento andalu all day. At the end of the hike he was taking a photo of the whole group and counted out ¨Uno, Do, Tre¨ (instead of uno, dos, tres) and the priest who organized the group proclaimed with much laughter (and some pride) that Nathan now speaks Andalu! ;)

While the locals are very proud of their Andalusian accent, within the global community of Spanish speakers it is not exactly the most posh of accents :) We´ve been joking that we might need to spend some time soon in a different part of Spain before Nathan´s accent becomes irrevocably andalu  ;)

Winter has arrived

Well, pretty much immediately after my last post about how fall has graciously extended into November with lovely weather, winter suddenly arrived. It is now definitely cold! (Not below freezing or anything, but colder than 10+. Gloves and scarves are now in order!)

As proof that we have not yet dipped below freezing point, there are still certain types of flowers that are still blooming!

We went on a lovely excursion with some friends this weekend to Las Cahorros. It is a beautiful spot on the edge of Monachil, a small town about 8kms away from Granada. The trail runs alongside a river, there are several hanging bridges and some parts of the trail go through caves/natural tunnels. It is quite lovely! It is also a popular destination to go rock climbing (Nathan is dying to go back there with some climbing gear and try out some of the many routes that are already set up for sport climbing).

 

Hasta pronto :)

-Candyce

Weather and Television

We have been really enjoying the weather here so far. It is hard to believe it is already the middle of November without the expected daily gloom and rain of a west coast winter.

The weather here is unique compared to other parts of the Andalusian region. Granada is right on the doorstep of the Sierra Nevada and they strongly influence the weather patterns here. We´ve been warned on numerous occasions to expect rain and at least some cold weather,  especially in December and January. But so far the temperature has been quite moderate and lovely.

It is not unusual for the mornings and evenings to be cool (8-15 Celcius), but midday still warms up to over 20 degrees. Dressing in layers is usually a good idea, even though in the middle of the day it is hard to believe that you will want a jacket later. As I am not a fan of hot weather, this is pretty much perfect for me. :)

Apparently this fall has been especially warm and dry, which is a bonus for us. And we´ve been taking advantage of it in various ways: we went on an all-day hike with Joaquín and his friends last weekend en Los Alayos, we went on a tour of the Sacromonte neighbourhood (where the gypsies live/lived) with one of our language exchange friends one warm evening this week, and we are planning on going on another smaller hike in Monachil this weekend with a few other friends. (Unfortunately, for unknown reasons we´ve been forgetting our camera lately, so I don´t have photos, but as other friends took photos on all our various excursions, maybe eventually I can include some of those. :)

One weird thing we´ve been incorporating into our schedule over the past month is TV. In Canada we pretty much never watch TV. We don´t have one. We don´t follow TV programs. We never know what upcoming shows are, what the latest commercials are, etc. Which is fantastic, in my opinion, as there is too much life to live to spend hours and hours of it watching TV (besides, I have facebook and too many other ways to waste my time, so TV doesn´t normally make the cut in my books).

However, our apartment came with a TV and basic cable, so we do have the option to watch it. And since all programming is (obviously) in Spanish, we can actually use it as an ´educational´ tool. Programs are a mix of Spanish and US shows (including some ridiculous Spanish gameshows). One interesting thing is that the US shows are never subtitled - they are always dubbed. In fact, we´ve been told it can be a good job to be a voice star on a program, as you can be the voice actor for season after season for a character. And as long as you don´t focus on the characters mouths, you can almost forget that the original is in English. (Although when watching Bones it is a little funny to hear Booth constantly refer to Temperance as Huesos...).

Things continue to go very smoothly here, which we are very thankful for. We are especially enjoying the opportunities to continue to get to know folks here. :) I hope you are doing well and enjoying November (no matter what early winter weather you may have)!

With love,

Candyce (and Nathan)

Mission: Make Friends

The hardest part about moving is leaving behind a loving community: family, friends, church, choirs, etc.  To suddenly be in a new city with much to learn and new faces always surrounding you. For us, traveling as a couple, it is a little easier since we have each other, but our main mission (post-finding an apartment) has been to make some friends!

We weren't starting at zero of course, because we already had my friend and colleague, Joaquín and his family, who hosted us for the first two weeks. And of course I have met a few people through my work here. Joaquín has also introduced us to quite a few of his friends (he invited us to a weekly prayer service, "house church" style always followed by lots of food and conversation). We even got to meet the Archbishop of Granada as he happens to be part of Joaquín's circle of friends. :)

In addition to Joaquín's network, we have also attended a variety of Taize-style services where we have met quite a few very friendly people. Last night we attended a "Día de los Muertos" party that a new friend invited us to. She is from Mexico and for the past 6 years that she has been in Granada she has hosted her own Day of the Dead party to celebrate this Mexican festival. She invited many international as well as local students that she knows and it was a very fun evening. Spanish with all sorts of accents: Slovakian, Italian, Polish, Mexican, and of course the very strong local Andalusian.

We have also joined a choir! Through a friend of Joaquín's we learned of a choir that specializes in Baroque and early music. It's not a professional choir (and therefore both Nathan and I can sing in it!) but it is a very friendly group who get together for a couple of hours on Sunday evenings.  Apparently rehearsal is almost always followed by conversation and tapas at the restaurant across the street, so it is another good opportunity to get to know folks better. :)

And, of course, all of these new friends are extremely helpful for our language goals. We are studying many hours each day and both of us are making rapid progress, but practicing in real conversations is what really solidifies new vocabulary and grammar structures. :) For me it is exciting how much I am remembering, which enables me to speak with more and more confidence. After a 4 year hiatus from speaking Spanish it is coming back to me. And Nathan is already at a higher level than he has ever been at after being here for only 1 month! So we are both fairly stoked regarding our language studies. :)

Wishing you a blessed Sunday as you enjoy your extra hour of Daylight Savings sleep this morning. :)

Love,
Candyce