Fever in Madrid

Monday July 23, 2007
This is it. We’re rounding the corner to the home stretch. One week to go with something like finals and then regular classes with more games than normal for the rest of the time. I should be studying for my culture class, but I can’t quite wrap my head around studying—I’d much rather wisp through my thoughts and blog it up.
This weekend I met my friend Annie in Madrid, but I was then and am now terribly ill, so it put a bit of a damper on experiencing the city. I would have very much liked to see the Reyna Sofia… but I instead Annie and I migrated back and forth from the fancy Vincci Capitol at Gran Villa 41 to VIPS, which seems to be this 24 hour 7-11/Borders/Corner Bakery sort of place. They have a little café, they have movies and books and magazines to buy (not to mention the brand new Harry Potter book) and they also have a fairly delectable selection of cheeses, juices, breads, wines, cookies and other goodies. Our first night we got a little excited and went for the fois grois (sp?), brie, pate, caviar and mini toasts selection (all for about 3 Euros a piece). Three Euro caviar isn’t half bad, I must say, although it’s been quite some time since I’ve had caviar let alone caviar worth more than 3 Euros. I’ve got to change that. I really love caviar. Mmmmm, fisheggs. What did I ever do as a vegetarian?
Saturday (after having spent Friday night enjoying my crisp linens) I actually felt relatively well, so Saturday was our big walk about Madrid day. That was the day that we walked by the Reyna Sofia. Sigh. Our intentions were to actually go inside, but we were having such a good time talking that we waltzed on by and decided if the mood struck us we’d go Sunday. Sundays, we decided are much better days to visit museums than Saturdays. We’d also gotten our hearts set on seeing a bull fight, so we googled up how to make that happen on Annie’s Blackberry (one of the only perks of working for Dow Jones is that she gets a Blackberry with unlimited Google stalking capability in the convenience of a cell phone). So, after chatting in the grass outside the royal gardens and then a brisk walk through the garden, we walked up past the Prado and past any number of other noteworthy monuments and Capital-like buildings and history-laden buildings, we made it to the Plaza de las Ventas.
The man in the window unfortunately informed us, that bullfight tickets for the next day were, one, only sold the day of the fight, and two, the fight was at 8:30 and my train was scheduled to leave at 9:30. Bullfights were out of the question for us beleaguered travelers. Recortes, on the other hand were staring us straight in the face tempting us with promises of taught, daring young men, who might run about a ring with a bull, daring the bull to gouge their soft parts with his horns.
We actually had no idea what we bought tickets for. The man in the window (who was very amused with Annie’s flamboyant attempt to remember the Spanish she learned in high school that somehow turns mildly into French since she’s living in Brussels now and speaks mostly that) told us in broken English that Recortes are basically young men jumping over bulls. Young men? We’re thinking… now how young are these so called “young men.” Are they old enough that we might gawk at them and not blush for gawking at such young, “young men?” Because if they had youth and danger on their side, we were ready to take our stand as spectators. And spectate we did.
Annie by the end of the night and a half a bottle of wine was yelling out unabashedly, “te quiero numero siete!” much to the amusement of the Spanish folk around us. We made friends, and most of the women in our section agreed numero siete was a sexy little feller. Then again, they were all fairly easy to look at. Sorry Bryan. Heh. I’m pretty sure that number seven actually won the bout, actually. If I understood correctly the object is to get the bull to run after you, while you’re jutting out your pelvis and raising your arms in an awkward and unappealing way, and then at the last minute as the bull is charging towards you, dodge him. He’s a healthy bull too. He’s not been stabbed a couple of dozen times before entering the ring. This was some dangerous stuff. At one point, we understood why the man in the window explained to us that the young men were jumping over bulls, for in fact, a young man literally did so. The bull was charging him, heading straight towards him, and somehow the young man decided now was the time he would put his young man testosterone to use and as the bull approached him he leapt lengthwise over the whole animal, landed, and took a victory bow. It was a massively impressive move. The man behind us said he’s been coming to see Recortes’ many times and has rarely, if ever, seen young boys actually jump over bulls. Or maybe he said something else and I totally misinterpreted his Spanish. Hate how that happens sometimes, but lets put that behind us and just say it was true. I’d like to think that we saw something rare and special that night. I’d feel better about missing out on the rest of Madrid if that were the case.
Other than that Madrid was pretty uneventful… suppose I was due for an uneventful weekend though, so I’m not too worried. What I am a bit worried about is my culture test tomorrow. I think I best put this to rest and study up on some gastronomía and fiesta of the 17 autonomous states 50 provinces two island chains, and two random African cities of Spain. What a mess.
PS. Anyone ever stayed in a hotel where you need your room key to turn on the light? I spent a lot of time in the dark there for a minute until I figured out how to call the front desk and eventually discovered you’ve got to put the key in the slot by the door. What ever is wrong with a good old-fashioned light switch I wonder? They’ve got buttons, but they’re only related to different ambiance modes for the light. Dios mio.

Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Este jueves voy a cocinar la cena para mis compañeras de cuarto, mi “señora,” y su novio. Me gustaría cocinar algunas cosas diferente y no se exactamente que quería cocinar. Debería cocinar algo Americana o solo algo que me gusta? Pienso que voy a cocinar curry con muchas verduras, arroz y pollo, pero ningún persona en este casa gusta arroz oscuro! Que problema! Son mas o menos la misma cosa, arroz blanco y arroz oscuro son todavía arroz, y el sabor es lo mismo en los dos también pero arroz oscuro tiene mas vitaminas. Es verdad. Mi madre estaré muy triste si no me gusta arroz oscuro.
No obstante, mas que arroz, mis compañeras de cuarto no se gustan las verduras tampoco! Si. Que vida sin vida. Podría cocinar solo arroz y pollo y nada más y ellas estarían muy contentas.