Dia del Carne at Melrose

At Marly's request...

The other day was Dia de los Cruces, which meant the entire city was filled with giant crosses built with carnations (and occasionally other materials) and everyone dressed in traditional gear- colorful flamenco dresses for the ladies and long striped pants with suspenders, a red sash and a hat for the men. It was really cool to walk around and see everyone dressed like this, in addition to random people dancing and singing all over the place. I also was a big fan of the men riding around the city on horses.

We’ve moved into a new place (number 4 for me in this country) in a neighborhood called Realejo. We wanted to live here because it is nice and quiet and a good part of town. So we looked at probably 25 different apartments and weren’t able to live in any of them due to neither Carol or I having proof of a job in Spain. (Neither of us receive steady pay slips for selling paintings or teaching private students.) So we were getting fairly desperate when a friend of a friend of Carol’s mentioned that his building had an opening. We went over the next day and pretty much signed right up. It’s not our ideal- a basement with no direct light- but it's new, clean and will be cool in the hot hot summer. We also love most of our neighbors. Upstairs across from the courtyard live Jaime and David and the top two floors are taken by Javie. These guys have named the place Melrose, and have created such a fun and comfortable environment. We all eat together some days on the roof terrace outside of Javie’s apartment (whether he’s here or not) and we have no qualms about inviting ourselves to sit down in someone else’s living room. The other night we had a lovely dinner with meat and wine from Portugal that Javie brought back. He and David have a music or event production company, so they have all sorts of cool music and lighting equipment. Jaime is a pharmacist. 

Yesterday we had Dia del Carne in the small courtyard (not really the right word for it- just the open tiled area in the middle of all our apartments) with various meats from here, as well as some TEXAS BRISKET that my dad brought me!!! Everything was delicious. We were joined by some of their friends so there were about 8 of us total. After way too much meat and cerveza we packed a nice little tea party and walked to the park nearby to sit in the sun and play chess and backgammon (I was the undefeated backgammon champion!) It is a rough life. I love being able to hang out and speak so much Spanish too!

The only problem at Melrose is the apartment directly above ours. It was taken (the day before us) by a couple with a two year old- and the woman is 8.5 months pregnant. These people NEVER sleep. The kid runs up and down the halls at all hours screaming – seriously until about 3 or 4 in the morning and then starts back up at 6. We’re also pretty sure they have a bowling alley set up up there. It is still phenomenally better than our last place though.

We had only been moved in for a few days when my parents came to visit!!! I was so excited to see them, even though it was only for two days. We had a great time- mostly just walking around the city and seeing all the important stuff like the Albaycin and the Alhambra. We had one really delicious dinner, but for the most part didn’t get the chance to sample the tapas. They left from here to Rome and then Prague to see my dad’s family there.

On Friday night I went out for the first time in ages. We went to a couple of our usual bars and then ended up at a bar/club in sacromonte called Camborio. It was really cool, the top floor was way up and completely surrounded by glass on the inside with a large terrace on the outside all with incredible views of the Alhambra lit up at night. Claire, Alessandra and I danced until the wee hours.

SABES QUE...

There are no tooth fairies in Spain. Instead, there is a tooth mouse named Ratoncito Pérez.