musings from spain

it's been raining and freezing for five days straight now, even as we cross country borders! i definitely packed too lightly, coming from the mediterreanan where we have had heat waves in december, and still no snow in the pyrenees. but it helps to look on the bright side...the rainy, dark skies make wandering through the mazes of small, cobble-stoned streets and city canals all the more romantic and colloquial. never mind that my socks are soaked and feet freezing. =(

anyway, today we find ourselves in antwerp, belgium, after three days in equally cold and rainy and windy brittany and then day-long stops in bruge and ghent. i'm a big fan of belgium so far...very different ambiance than you'll find in france...more modest and workmanship-ish, if that makes any sense. rather than imagining nobles and kings in their luxurious castles, here i can easily picture tradesmen and shoe cobblers and chocolate makers in their shops churning out their wares. i like the little cities of belgium so far!

been having nice pension and hostel experiences too...i think once i'm back in barcelona, i'll start compiling a travel section in my blog, with comments and a list of nice places i've stayed during my travels these two years. it'd be a nice reminder for me too...i don't want to let my horrible memory erase all these nice (and at times not so nice) travel moments.

bueno, hasta luego! or as they say here in flemish, vaarwel!

            a sunset view of la dordogne river1100 kilometers of french countryside covered, a bottle of authentic bordeaux wine bought from st. emilie itself, perhaps a kilo heavier as a result of quite a bit of foie gras munching, and one medival and six renaissance castles later, i find myself in a little pension in nantes (with free internet...yay!), on the very edge of the bretagne province. it's been little french village hopping along the way, from barcelona to toulouse to bordeaux and then the loire valley region, where there is an ENDLESS number of castles in the region...you can't drive through a town without one of their own, either towering over the "normal" houses.  the french countryside has been beautiful as expected...flat vibrant fields of green, or full of wineyards, ducks, geese, sheep, and hairy cows and horses...it's all so picturesque and quaint!  so cute!  and the castles are
the castle of chenonceau on the loire riverIMPRESSIVE.  it's funny...the romantic side of me is in awe of the luxurious castles with equally luxurious gardens, many with their own forest and several of them with a private wing still being used and lived in by some lucky-blooded luxurious family, while the american, against the concept of royal or imperial priviledge side of me can't help but feel the superficialness and injustness of it all.  but i think the romantic side is winning...there's just something magical about walking through these buildings and imagining the royal feasts and parties, with ladies in waiting and dignified men (and the king, of course!), wandering around the halls in full-fledged costume.  it's just all so romantic!

ok, time to get off as we've got one adsl line and there's another laptop that's waiting for their fix of juice.   tout alors!  =)

hello, friends!  being on vacation has made me good and lazy...ahh.  my schedule these days have been spanish classes in the morning (i think i'm finally getting that darn subjuntivo down pat, even in imperfecto form), a relaxing lunch at home, a siesta on the couch with friends dubbed over in spanish on tv, and then up again for some reading at a cafe and a trip to the gym.  i should not work forever.  =)

that said,  i'm loving the books i've been reading lately.  it's so inspiring to read about these great innovative companies, both inside and out, who have really figured out how to both connect with their consumers on social and emotional levels, and foster creativity and inspiration from within.   although it's going to be terribly scary and stressful, i'm actually looking forward to starting the job search in a couple months.  let's hope that i find what i'm looking for!  my latest favorite book finds, the brand gap and zap by marty neumeier.  truly inspirational.

so i'm VERY far behind on my blog postings!  magaz and salamanca over the new year's and then the bay area in january all seem so long ago!  and i'm off again tomorrow for a road trip around france and hopefully belgium and switzerland.  so before the backlog gets too long, here goes a short recap on magaz and salamanca:

• little quaint, trapped-in-time magaz...what can i say?  imagine a little pueblo in the middle of northern spain, surrounded by hazy, rocky fields where potatoes grow and nothing much else, population 30, and a little house with its ancient kitchen tucked away in the corner where an 87, feisty woman continues to live with her 90-year-old husband.  in the garage are rickety old tractors that are still towed out to the fields in the spring, and in the old kitchen hang home-cured sausages and ham from the six pigs that the family has raised during the year and slaughtered themselves.  let me tell you, the authentic spanish experience doesn't get any more spanish than that!  a nice place to be for a couple days, but after a week, one does get quite restless.  so to combat the restlessness, off we went to salamanca for two days.
• salamanca - the city of fellow american expat in spain, the wandering woman (hi!!  finally i'm blogging about your wonderful town!  sorry for the delay), whom i must thank very much (again!) for all the recommendations on places to go.  we arrived on a day where a light fog was busy blanketing the city and casting a very romantic glow on all the amazingly beautiful buildings of the city, and left the next day with our stomaches full of many tasty and very well priced pinchos from the very authentic and quite delicious bambu bar, that we went to twice!  i did not find the astronaut or the ice cream cone, but yes the frog, albeit with quite a bit of help.  i blame my broken contacts and out-dated glasses.  =)  and i have to mention a very special moment during the trip, while we were taking a break from wandering the city at the lovely la regenta bar (recommendation of the wandering woman, of course), sipping on a warm tea and reading, when they started playing buika's latest.  yay!  man, i love that woman.
  

i've uploaded more pictures in snapshots...they've been there for the last month, albeit without a post.  enjoy!

now it's time for me to head out of my apartment and wander the city again, where barcelona's been extremely warm these days, which doesn't stop me from having a nice toasty coffee at a bar somewhere.   it's a nice time in my life now...a calm before the next big life adjustment begins, where it's back to the states  and real life, in a way.  two years away...i wonder how i'll handle being back?

there's a package from orange waiting for me at home in barcelona with an auto-installation kit for ADSL...yay!   these three months of vacation before i head back to the states without easy internet access were unthinkable, so i crumbled and my little powerbook will be powered with internet once again after a two year hiatus.  yay!

in the meantime, i'm in andorra and then off to león tomorrow, spending christmas and new year's with my adoptive family out here.  and...i'm officially unemployed now...heh heh.  donations are welcome.  =) and now that i'm officially on vacation, i´ve had the time to upload pics.  so cruise over to snapshots to see pics from my visit to toulouse in france and surroundings, and a very nice pre-christmas dinner with friends that included fondue and christmas hats for all.

so how do i feel as a non-working woman?  first feeling: relieved.  working in spain, at this company, has not been easy, with cultural differences in the way things are communicated, the way people work, power structures, etc.  on the other hand, i leave feeling very satisfied with what i've achieved and how this experience will support the potential for the future.  of course, we'll see what happens when i've in the full job search process, but for now, i feel confident.  if i can join a high-pressure consulting company with the basic ability to communicate severely diminished, and then two years later i can present in front of the client in Spanish and with a document that i´ve written in spanish, then that's pretty darn good for me.  so estoy contenta.

ok, enough of patting myself on the back.  =)  what's next is vacation, job search, and the challenge of moving back to the states.  so stay tuned for new musings, observations, and thoughts in 2007.

happy new years to all!

the christmas dinner that is waiting for me:

bones festes, feliz navidad, and merry christmas to all!  =)