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I was never a dancer. Mainly because I couldn't get the rhythm. And now I've moved on from this, a Balinese dance, to a Kazak dance - a waltz. Crazy. I can't believe it. This is partly why I'm putting it on my blog. Maybe that'll help me believe it.
This year's festivities started out with a bang ... or perhaps it'd be better to say they were "electrifying". As we were getting ready, I went to turn the lights on in the living room and the bulbs blew out. So, in an attempt to get more light, I unplugged the lamp in our bedroom ... except, I didn't. I just took the cap off the plug, leaving the live whatevers-they-are exposed. I started to pull them out, realized it wasn't even the plug I needed & went to push it back in.
Need to think about the consequences of that action?
I apparently should have.
I can't remember ever being electrocuted before, but then maybe that's an effect of being electrocuted. Wow. My hand trembled for a good 20 minutes after that.
Maybe this should be listed under "Stupid Things Mara Does". Under the category of "Stupid Things Mara Says" can be included "I sunk my Palm Pilot". Yup - the updated version of a battleship, heheheheh.
In brief, check out the pictures if you haven't seen them:
We loved our trip. In Barcelona we stayed with friends - the ones you see in the pictures. Vicenc cooked us paella - mmm. He is by far one of the best human beings I ever met. He is kind, sincere, humble, loving, gentle ... and if all goes well, he should be a daddy by tomorrow! I hear his wife, Shannon just went in to labor...
In Zaragoza, Hector very generously opened his home to us and made himself completely available to us. He gave us a guided trip around the city. We probably would have found it boring if it hadn't been for him. And Krisia - she came and joined us in the touring. Funny story: we decided to have Chinese for lunch one day. BAD IDEA. Everything was fried, we were so sick by the end. One of dessert options was pineapple, so, naively, we picked that to have something "fresh". It was STRAIGHT from a can. One slice on this pitiful plate. Krisia took a picture it was so pitiful. At least the lunch was cheap...
Then we went to Toledo. I cannot rave about Toledo enough. The city is beautiful and the people are wonderful. And if you use Fodor's instead of the Lonely Planet, we know where the bingo hall is :-) Okay, so Fodor's is a bit tamer than Lonely Planet ... a bit more "middle class traveler". It actually tells you where to find a bingo hall. In Spain? You're in Spain and you have a hankering for BINGO? Whatever. We thought it was hysterical and then ... it was there. The bingo hall! So, that explains the bingo picture in Toledo. (not that you've seen it yet - sorry)
Madrid - enh, we started out by walking into a museum exhibit that turned out to basically be pornography. No, that's too gentle. It WAS porn. Period. That seriously pissed me off. Sorry, I know that's not a nice word, but I was. Anyway, there were better cities.
Like Bilbao. The Guggenheim ROCKS as a museum. Now there's a museum that knows it's all about the presentation. And the old city was fun, the food was great, Krisia was there, and so was a Mango outlet. I couldn't resist, but Mark and Krisia will both attest that I was in and out in 30 minutes at most.
Or San Sebastien - another beautiful city. It was cold, gray and oh-so-perfect. We walked along the boardwalk from one side of the city to the other. It was beautiful - very picturesque. I think it's how I imagine European cities when novels say they went to "summer" somewhere. Which makes sense because that is apparently what people have been doing there for 200 years or so.
San Sebastien has both the coolest and worstest bathrooms. Coolest: translucent (but not transparent) sliding doors conceal the sink area leading to both the men's and women's toilet. If you stand at the mirror and do anything you give the people outside (us, as the case may be) a show. Mark did a whole puppet show for us :-) It didn't have soap though. On the other side of town, we went for tea & waffles (dessert waffles). Worstest toilet: this tiny space COULD have been used effectively. Instead they placed the toilet paper roll on the wall next to the toilet that was so close to it that in order to get the TP you banged your arm against the big metal cylinder containing the TP like 4 times. Huh? Then when I washed my hands, with soap, but sorry this was still unforgivable, the faucet was wrong for the sink, so I banged my hands against the sink. Grr. And the women's toilet was out of TP, whereas the men's had extra... I stole the extra from the men's. Anyway, frustrating. We laughed.
By the way, don't try to watch "Out of Africa" in a language you don't understand. It makes no sense whatsoever!!!
I think that's the best way to sum up the past two weeks. I needed that.
Okay, I would have survived, but since I have such a luxury of taking a vacation, I'm glad I was able to because it totally rejuvenated me. It was exciting, fun, relaxing and so very not Israel. People dressed well in a variety of ways. Superficial, I know, but it feels like such a radically high percentage of Israelis dress so poorly, it was nice to see a diversity of clothing styles that weren't offensive. And yes, wearing your clothes 3 sizes to small is offensive to me.
But that's just the beginning. Despite rumors, the food was awesome. Sorry about the people who got bum deals and had bad food - the food we had was great, and we do not lack good food here amongst the diverse peoples found at the Baha'i World Centre.
Plus, we stayed with friends - or friends of a friend who became our friends - the whole time. That rocked. We met tons of wonderful people all the way along. The Baha'i community of Toledo will remain particularly clear in my memory. They were exuberant, cheerful, loving and patient. We had a wonderful holy day celebration with them (the Birth of Baha'u'llah). The children performed a skit, we played games, Mark & presented a slideshow of Haifa and Akka - and we had yummy food from Peru, mmmm. Good stuff.
Then we headed out to the Basque country, which was beautiful (like the rest of Spain) and restful and fun because we were with our friend Krisia. Yay!
I will tell more, I swear, but I have to run to rehearsal.
By the way, I had a life changing experience last night. If I don't write about it eventually, nag me :-)
And Rae, you (and you alone) are allowed to nag me about definitions of success and failure. I have thought about it, though I don't know if I have definite conclusions. I do like some of my thoughts though :-)
And Sjona: I LOVE YOU!!
Woohoo! We leave late Thursday evening (ick) and we'll be there two weeks. We'll be staying with Shannon and her husband (who are very expecting, and for the context of my family: she is the daughter of Judy & Don, pioneers to Uruguay, who know my aunt and uncle. She also served at the BIC in Geneva with Mark.). After visiting Barcelona for a few days, we'll go to Zaragoza - and stay with more friends, and then move on to Bilboa to see KRISIA! Whom we love and adore oodles! We'll stay there about a week before heading south to Toledo. First time in my life I've been excited about heading to Toledo. Okay, second. When I was in ninth grade I went to the University of Toledo (Ohio, USA) for a summer session on film - that was awesome! But Toledo Ohio isn't exactly the most riveting place on the planet, let alone in Ohio. That's beside the point, really, 'cause we're going to Spain!!!