Got home a little before 7 this morning. It was definitely not my inention to stay out all night again, and for most of today I was sorry I had. At least had much less to drink this time, but still did not sleep well and felt a little iffy for a while. Am hoping next weekend I will have the sense to go home after tapas instead of following the girls to the O'Connell's dance floor. (Though I must admit, we did meet some very striking Morrocan men there who were fabulous dancers. Almost makes the hangover worthwhile...;*)
Despite the resaca (hangover), had to get up and head out to where the girls are staying. Had a little lunch with them and then we went to meet H., who showed us the apartment in Los Aguiles. The apartment is nice, though the decor is not at all to my taste. We would have to cover the couches with sheets and take down the hideous painting in the living room. But the apartment gets a lot of light and, while it's small, it's not a bad size. There is one bedroom that is about twice the size of the other two and has a double bed. The girls & I have already decided that if we take the apartment we'd have to rotate rooms every so often so we could all enjoy some time in the big room. But the highlight of the trip was H. himself. A beautiful, beautiful man in his early thirties...honest and warm and with a sense of humor...took a chunk of time out of his weekend to meet with us and was extremely patient while I translated. He's actually the son of the apartment's owners & is just helping them out while they are on vacation. The girls & I joked afterwards that we might have to take the apartment just to see H. every now & then. Hee hee.
On a completely unrelated note, I have to say that almost all my preconceptions about the Spanish have been proved false. Unlike Sevilla, Madrid is a place with a lot more diversity. For example, there is an enormous population of Latin American immigrants here. And while in Sevilla the women were stick insects and everyone dressed to the nines, here there are plenty of overweight individuals and most people dress just like they do in Portland. There's a little bit of everything. Have seen young men wearing baggy jeans hanging off their non-existent asses, have seen women go out in pink track suits with matching flats, everyone and their grandmother wears flip-flops (saw one grandmother wearing flip-flops with kitten heels!!!), and even saw one guy in the metro who was wearing pajama bottoms with his flip-flops. The good side to all of this is that I don't feel nearly as self-conscious and inadequate here as I'd expected to. I'd expected to feel fat and unfashionable, but instead I feel I fit in...and am even sometimes better dressed than most!
Deep thought of the day: I find it both odd and compelling that the word esperar means both "to hope" AND "to expect." They don't have separate words for these concepts. Which means that hopes and expectations are the same thing in this language.
A cool thing happened just now: a Real Madrid game is on TV and most people in my neighborhood are watching it, either at their homes or in bars...somebody must have made a goal (or barely missed it) because just now a cry of surprise rose up and filled the barrio. I could hear it through the closed patio door and over the buffeting wind.
Oh, that story about the football game really makes me miss Spain.
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