Mollyblog

Silly conversation. Serious thoughts.

Earlier at dinner tonight, Heather and I were laughing about the mascot for Cruzcampo beer, a portly fellow with shoulder-length straight brown hair holding a frothy mug of hops.

“He doesn’t look Spanish,” I said.

“He looks Dutch,” said Heather. “And like he lives in a forest.”

We constructed a further story about him, running a tavern in the forest and having gone to junior high school with Friar Tuck from the Robin Hood stories.

Later, as we were walking home, we passed another Cruzcampo advertisement, this one with a different version of the same man. “Sometimes his head is smaller than his body,” Heather pointed out.

“That’s because he’s Danish,” I said.

“Dutch,” she corrected me.

“How do you know?”

“The Danish are all blonde,” she said, pointing to the brunette mascot.

“All of them?”

“Every one I’ve met,” she said. “It’s an easy little country where everyone matches.”

I think for a minute.

“I wish I were Danish,” I say.

“Why?”

“Because then I would match,” I say.

She thinks.

“Do you feel mismatched?”

I think about this.

“A lot less than I used to,” I say, which is true. But the truth is, I do sometimes still feel mismatched. From other people my age, with the way I dress, with the way I think. Sometimes I still feel like I’m the only person in the world who feels the way I do, and that I’ll never find anyone who truly knows me and, with that knowledge, truly loves me.

“I don’t think life is any easier for the Danish,” said Heather.

And then I snapped back to myself.

Of course not. Life isn’t any easier for any of us. We all feel singular. We all ARE singular. And yet we all still keep reaching out, believing, trusting, hoping that we can connect to each other, despite the fact that there are parts of me no one will ever know, and parts of others I can never touch.

Free Bird!

Seen scrawled across a fabric construction barrier outside the cathedral in Granada:

Translation: I am a free bird. Intentional rock-and-roll reference, or coincidence? You decide.

My Journal Saves My Ass

I love my journal.

And not only because it contains my thoughts, nor because it gives me something to do while sitting here waiting for Heather, my computer battery all dead, nor even because I have somewhere to write that Really Important Thing I Can’t Forget.

It’s because, in a pinch, journal paper makes for great emergency toilet paper. And that, my friends, is truly invaluable.

Drunk drunk drunk drunk drunk

Heather was jealous of me when I woke today, rested and happy and blissful with my earplugs. Apparently, I’d missed a whole hour of loud talking, doors slamming, showers going on and off. Some girls had come home from the bar in the middle of the night, said Heather, “and they were drunk drunk drunk drunk drunk.” Why else, she figured, would they make so much noise at such a ridiculous hour?

Then we realized it was 11am. And the girls making the noise must’ve been making it around 10am. Which meant it was more likely they were just waking up than just coming home – and either way, it wasn’t rude at all to assume the rest of the hostel would be up and about too.

It was we who had it wrong, confused by the fact that the middle-of-our-sleep was not, in fact, the middle-of-the-night.

“Oh,” said Heather. “Maybe they weren’t that drunk after all.”

Oon Cha Oon Cha All Night Long

Saturday again, which means one thing: time to rally. Heather wasn’t feeling 100 percent, so it took some coaxing, but we managed to leave the house with the intention of going dancing. And go dancing we did.

But first we started with the Spanish ritual (finally having perfected the schedule here). Dinner around 9, drinking around 11, and no stepping foot in a club until at least 1am. By the time we made our first stop at Granada 10, we were both buzzed (thank you, whiskey) and Heather was starting to get in the groove.

Now, I should say that Granada 10 (Calle carcel Baja 3, 8 Euros to get in) is a classic club in the best and worst sense. The building is an old theater, and it has that gorgeous, high-ceilinged, multi-leveled feel you’d expect of such a place. Couches are covered in gold lame fabric. Drinks come in slender glasses and glow green and blue in the blacklight. When I came here five years ago, the music was all European techno and bad American pop (think Jennifer Lopez and newer Cher), but this time it was all Spanish pop all of the time. Heather and I did as much as we could with the music and the meat-market aspect of the place, until a couple of Danish men chased us away with their bigotry (likening all Andalucians to rednecks, though they both live and work in Andalucia) and uninspiring conversation (I fared better than Heather, though, talking to the taller one about politics and the media). We pulled the “I’ll be right back” move, grabbed our jackets and headed to the next location.

We’d done a bit of research before we went out and knew a place called El Camborio had dj music. So we started heading in the general direction of where we thought it might be. On the way, we passed a lively bar with people spilling out into an alley, so we took a detour. Peeking through the window at Fondo Reservado (Cuesta de Santa Ines 3, three blocks upriver from Plaza Nueva and up the hill to the left), I saw a large man with a blonde bob, pink lipstick and a 50’s-style green dress. Drag queens. Yes!

“This might be a boy bar,” said Heather. “You okay with that?”

Of course, I was. With fond memories of dancing at Embers in Portland running through my brain, and the promise of absolutely no unwanted (or even wanted) sexual attention, we paid the cover and packed in to the tiny, loud club. Music that could only be described as techno, not electgronica, pounded through the speakers. We waded through a sea of beautiful boys, with the occasional girl standing out like an island of estrogen. Almost no one paid attention to us, which was blissfully welcome. The large drag queen squeezed by us, and another – wearing long blonde hair, a halter top and black pants – go-go danced next to the dj, who started spinning a mix of Madonna’s “Vogue”.

Had the place not been shoulder-to-shoulder packed and gotten Heather clausterphobic, we easily could have stayed here all night. But the need for oxygen pushed us on.

(By the way, for more info on the gay scene in Granada, which is alive and well, see this website.)

Next was the long walk to El Camborio, up the street that crosses the river and taking a right at a fork in the road far, far up from where we started. But finding it was worth it. A strange, fascinating place with rooms like caves (literally) twisting and winding throughout. More latin pop, but this was infinitely more danceable than the kind we heard at Granada 10, and there was more room to move than at the boy bar. The best part, though, was our new friends: a man named alex, his shy friend who alex seemed to be trying to set up with one (or both) of us but not in  apushby way, and a large, friendly, open girlfriend of theirs named Concha.

“Where have you been?” she asked me right away. I told her Barcelona, San Sebastian, Bilbao, Sevilla, and here. "Where's your favorite?”

“Granada,” I said, truthfully. She kissed both my cheeks, gave me a hug and was our instant best friend.

The rest of the night, we danced with Concha and the boys, with Concha protecting us from the occasional Spanish predators who’d try to move too close to either one of us, and the boys being charming but not smarmy in the least.

When we finally decided to go home, they were disappointed – and surprised we were leaving. so we were surprised when, as we got back to the hostel, it was five in the morning.

We’d done it again – a perfect Spanish Saturday night, from two girls for whom it’s not at all intuitive – and on a night when Heather wasn’t sure she could make it past dinner. We fell into bed, happy. And satisfied we wouldn’t have to rally like this again for at least another week.

What About Bob?

It's Saturday night and I’m sitting in a bar called Dylan: Coffee & Cigarettes (in Plaza de la Romanilla), a place presumably dedicated to good old American Bob. But the bar, with its purple walls and gold baroque details and jet black bar doesn’t seem to have anything to do with Bob Dylan, except for the name and the man’s picture (a young Dylan, in case you were wondering) on the window.

However, the music is fantastic: Tom Petty’s “American Girl,”  Buffalo Sprinfield's “Stop, Hey, What's That Sound," The Mamas and the Papas' " California Dreamin’, and something by Morrissey.

And lucky us, it’s the second place we’ve been tonight with toe-tapping tunes. The first was Hannigan and Sons, an Irish bar on Cetti Meriem we visited because we assumed it was the most likely place to run into English speakers (which was true, but we forgot to specify “English speakers we’d actually want to speak to). We ordered Jameson’s on the rocks (for Heather, an old favorite. For me, an homage to Jeff.) And then we bopped to some of the best music we’ve heard in Spain: good old blues standards, OutKast, Franz Ferdinand, the Strokes, the Stones and Marvin Gaye. The only false note was the ‘80s atrocity “I’m so Excited,” but at least it brought entertaining memories of Jessie Spano’s brief stimulant addiction, so I could excuse it.

And now it’s the Dylan bar, with golden oldies from today, yesterday and the day before yesterday. We might’ve stayed for awhile, but we’d drained our rum and cokes, the our shoes were itching to dance, and we were being overrun by hipsters in identical rectangular-shaped glasses and middle-aged couples in strangely formal suits.

So it was bye, bye, Bob. Hello fiesta.

Anarchy in Andalucia

Yup, that's all.

Cilantro, Chocolate and Delicious Guitar

We’d meant to see Flamenco in Sevilla, where a huge festival was underway. But you know how we feel about Sevilla.

Luckily, Granada is also a center for Flamenco, and we decided to keep our eyes peeled for a place to see it that was as unlike Disneyland-does-flamenco as possible. Thanks to Heather, who spied a small flyer on a door during one of her walks, we found the perfect place.

Bar Huerto del Loro is a small, hidden club at the top of a series of stairs, right off the road that crosses the river towards the Sacromonte region (at Plaza de Santa Ana take the stairs upto C/Santa Ana, go left and follow the "road" up up up unti l you "run into" Cuesta de la Churra on the right side). It’s all reds and oranges, glowing lighting, and cavern-like rooms. Even better? Twice a week they feature a small, intimate flamenco performance by Juana “La Cilantra,” Carmela “La Chocolata” and Ruben Silva.

If only I could describe our profound delight at this discovery.

Perhaps 30 people could fit in the room where the dancer, singer and guitarist performed on a small stage, just feet from where we sat on small stools. This night, there were less than 20 in the audience. And far from the amateurs we expected to find, this trio was spectacular.

Juana, the dancer, wore a black dress with red flowers and a black swirling petticoat beneath it. She was lanky, statuesque, dark and serious, with smooth black waves framing her face and then hanging in a rope down her back. She looked nervous, a little uninspired when she sat in a wicker chair next to Carmela, the singer, and Ruben, the guitarist. But when she danced, she came alive – all precision and power and intense, but controlled, emotion. Her body moved from pose to pose like hard punctuation, rhythms pulsing from her swiftly moving feet.

Carmela was almost Juana’s exact opposite, soft and warm and earthy. She wore a simple black dress, a red rose tucked into her French twist. The music moved through her body like water, like air, as she danced in her chair and clapped her hands to the rhythm of the guitar. She smiled and laughed, emoted and played. With each song, Ruben would start with a slow, instrumental introduction, taking us up and down stairways of music until he reached a crescendo and the women would start their clapping. And then the music would well up within Carmela and spring forth from within her, as though she was making up each word on the spot. These songs are written for men to sing, and they’re all melodramatic love songs about women, but Carmela didn’t seem to mind. She sang about heartache and unrequited love and lust and want as though she was the first person to ever sing about them.

We were so struck by this music, all rhythm and passion, emotion and play. The songs are stories and they took me with them, thinking of current and past loves, my mind leaving the room and then returning to it with the quick flick of the guitarist’s hand or the deep groan of Carmela’s voice.

What a blessing to see this on such an intimate scale, to see Carmela and Ruben smile at each other, in love with the music and the audience and each other. To see Carmela and Juana cheer each other on, dance together at the end, take turns with their own particular styles.

This is not music for good girls, all quiet and repressed. This is virtuosity and freedom, technique mixed with instinct. It is dangerous and alive. Just the way music should be.

(Wondering about the connection between flamenco and tap dancing? I'm sure you were. There's some interesting info on Wikipedia. And more info here. )

Pity/Party

Yesterday I got myself into a bad mood. I was frustrated with the internet, stressed about work, inexplicably affected by events and people at home.

When I get in thesed moods, my instinct is to pull inwards, to be alone until the mood passes or the day ends – whichever comes first.

But that’s a mechanism I’ve developed in order to cope with the fact that I'm rarely with people who can relate to me in these states.

I’d forgotten that Heather is different.

When I got back to the room, cranky and quiet and not wanting to go out, she didn’t push. She didn’t try to guilt me into snapping out of it. She simply sat. Waited. Let me first pull in, then start to crawl out. Vent. Explain.

I told her about the hours trying to get online, the uncomfortable emotions starting to come up around going home, the tiredness, the food I ate that I didn’t really want.

Then ever so gently, she pointed out that I am in Spain. On vacation. Weeks away from making Halloween plans and with the afternoon’s frustration behind me.

I felt the stress seep out of my body, the aliveness return. I remembered, once again, that I would have to let go of home in order to truly be here, to return to myself, to this moment. I let her cradle me, then tackled her, laughing.

Fuck that, I decided. Fuck moping and pouting and carrying unnecessary emotional weight. Fuck living in other moments, past or future, ones I can’t control and which do not serve me. I released some anger by way of throwing my shirt, bra, jeans at my bed. 

Then I jumped up to dress for a night on the town; and suddenly, I was ready to party.

MeTube

So my camera has this handy little feature that lets me take short videos. And the internet has this handy little website that lets me post said videos. As a final piece to the techno-puzzle, my blog site lets me (gasp!) upload links to said website.

You'd think, then, that I would've played with this technology before now. But I didn't.

But better late than never.

So here's my first attempt at uploading a video, a little snippet from Carrie's performance in Barcelona. Keep in mind that my cinematography sucks and I didn't happen to capture the best moment of the performance - just the one moment I remembered to take video.

Whatever. It's an experiment, remember?