Eating in Spain and the absence of F.A

Eating:

Now I could not help but to compare the eating habits of Spaniards and Americans. I did again come to an understanding of why Americans are so fat and don't live as long as Europeans... No it is not because we are genetically different and pre-disposed to being fat. Additionally in Spain, there were some beer bellys but I only saw MAYBE one Pannus and that might have been an American. (shout out to Lindsey Smith) And even though in general Americans don't have the same access to healthcare as Spaniards, and that certainly doesn't help, I don't think it is due to our lack of access to health care(sorry Michael Moore). If you simply look at how we eat and live our lives vs how the Spaniards and probably the rest of the world does you will see it is because us Americans are determined to gorge ourselves for our "big meal."

So the Spaniards "big meal" is generally at around 2pm and rather than the normal sit around shut up and eat till your face is stuffed this time is as much about enjoying the time with the people you are eating with as much as nourishment. Also the meals are more about enjoying the food than being full. So imagine the big meal... You have some basket of bread which u share amongst 4 people that you dip in olive oil. Then 15 minutes or so after that they bring out the first dish, which is generally a vegetable of some sort(it might not be green, i.e a potato of some sort). After that you might enjoy something again light which is shared, like jamon(paper thin sliced ham), or crackers and a cheese spread, or duck liver spread(it actually tastes good, dont knock it till you try it) After that you will be given a main dish, which could be fish, chicken, or steak, with some type of starch. If you still want to eat after that all of your friends could share a dessert. This process takes about an hour to an hour and a half.

Now let's look at the differences and similarity between a Spaniards big meal meal and an Americans big meal:

• Spaniards eat as a family, Americans gorge themselves when they can and solo.

• Spaniards eat their main meal at 2pm, and even though they nap afterwards they still have about 8 hours after that until they go to sleep. American's main meal is at approximately 7pm to 9pm and after this face stuffing event we go to sleep about an hour and a half later.

• Spaniards have small pieces of bread which they dip in olive oil. Americans soak their bread in heart clogging butter.

• Spaniards big meal is probably under 1000 cals if I had to guess, while your average Americans big meal is at least 1500 cals.

• Spaniards eat their food for taste, and not to be full

• Problem is after eating a Spanish meal you will probably still be hungry, (if you are American, or really hungry)

• Spaniards food seems fresh and even the french fries don't have the excess grease feel, and were probably friend in olive oil
  

• The Spaniards also don't eat a whole lot of different colors, their food is extremely tan and brown which is generally a bad sign, it should be vibrant with a lot of colors

So the mindset of what a meal is, in Spain where it is a time to be around people you care about, relax, and let loose after your "stressful" day. In the US, generally we are famished by the time we eat and all we care about is getting as many calories as we can into our belly as soon as possible.

How the day goes as a Spaniard...

Now the Spanish have a slightly different lifestyle than in the US. The mid day siesta is a reality of life. Literally, from 2pm until 6pm everything shuts down. Everything closes except for most of Restaurants. This is extremely annoying when you wake up at 1:45. It is a completely different mindset than that of the American, where you work work work, to get ahead. In this socialist country it seems just kind of like whatever It may seem like the mid day nap is a waste of time, but it is a necessity when you are like the Spanish and go to sleep as late they do. Imagine staying up until 2am on a weeknight, then having to go to work the next day, by 2pm you will need a nap. Apparently, if you work in an office the day goes as such:

arrive at 9am

drink coffee/eat a breakfast type pastry until 9:30

work until 10:30

take a 15 to 30 minute smoke break

work until 12:15

take another 15 to 30 minute smoke break

work until 2:00pm

leave work, eat dinner, take a nap until 6pm.

Return to work at approximately 6pm, work until 9pm(taking smoke breaks every 30 mins)

Eat supper(snack at 930-10)

Go to sleep at approximately 12am

Not a bad life

New Friends...

So making friends when you can only partially speak the language is difficult, however I was able to manage this with decent success. I met some stand-up people while I was in Spain. Do I plan on keeping in touch with these people when I make my next random stop in Spain... possibly. Thanks to the advice of random world traveler Erica Alexis, I had already made a hotmail/msn messenger account, because Europeans are all about that. Anyway, Below I will chronicle people that i met.

Adolfo:

Apparently Adolfo thought I was real cool. Adolfo is from a town not too far from Plasencia and is a teammate of Dom's. It was a little hard because when I met him, he told me that he didn't speak ANY english. And this was while he was driving me to the little party area in Plasencia. My Spanish is not the best, which can make things slightly awkward. However, I've realized that partying is a universal language. Also oddly, he spoke no English, but LOVED American Hip Hop/Rap even though he probably has no idea what the songs are about. Imagine getting into his new Audi and hearing him bump "my president is black"... AWESOME!!!! Due to the the magic of facebook and the tagging I was able to find him and if nothing else we will probably remain friends on facebook.

Ouardo:

(the one in the middle) This was a friend of Adolfo that we met in Madrid. She was real excited, extra crunk when she met us. . I honestly thought she might turn out to be annoying, but apparently Spanish women can be like that. She spoke decent English, and combined with my decent Spanish we were able to communicate well. She does something in fashion, like a buyer/dresses people, something like thatShe ended up being SUPER cool. Cool as a fan, I'm real happy I met her. I actually forgot/never quite sure I knew her name but again thanks to the taggin of facebook photos, I was able to find her, and her name, and request a friendship.

Santana:

(The one in the middle in the Red.) He is another teammate from the Dominican Republic, and he was quick to tell me that he has a girlfriend that goes to North Carolina. He is a cool dude, who knows how to have a good time. I have my doubts about how much English he actually speaks, I'm not too sure he understood me when I was talking to him. According to his coach though, "some people mature at 15, 18, some at 28.... maybe you'll mature some day Santana"... ouch coach!!!!

Kris:


Kris is another teammate from South Philly, which he has conveniently tatted on his triceps, S on one, and P on the other. Kris speaks NO SPANISH at all, which is hilarious... imagine Dom translating EVERYTHING for him. He still goes out by himself and apparently that doesn't hinder much of his social life in Plasencia, if you catch my drift.

Nacho and his Girlfriend: 

I actually talked more to Nachos girlfriend than him. She was cool as a fan, and spoke no English. She is from Salamanca, and apparently I faked understanding Spanish, because she complimented me on my ability to understand Spanish. She moved to Plasencia to be with her real serious b/f Nacho, a teammate of Dom. I have no idea what her name was though. We ended up dancing it up that night. I was reminded by Nacho and told him repeatedly we're just dancing, y nada mas.

Dave:


Now this was the roommate of Dom. He came onto the team halfway through the Season. He is from Guadelupe, which is a French territory near St. Martinique. He speaks French, Spanish, and English all fluently. I'm not goin to lie, I was surprised when the roommate of Dom was a huge soft spoken black dude from the Islands. He was smart as I don't know what, but dropped out of college in France because he was making money playing basketball. I have his MSN messenger name and will no doubt keep in touch. He did A LOT of translating for me in the club with some special interests of mine.

Random Girls:

I met a lot of random girls. I remembered none of their names. I did learn that "hola mami" is not an appropriate way to make friends in Spain, but it is a good way to get laughed at. One of the best moments was when I met my new friends, we were talking to them, and she called me basically "hella cool" and I thought she called me a "son of a bitch." Thanks to Dom, we translated that one and dealt with that awkward moment. Again, special shout out to all the randoms I met whose names I do not remember!

Madrid...

Saturday, we did absolutely nothing but eat at like 9pm, so it is not worth mentioning.

So Madrid is the largest city in Spain. It is oddly like a mix of NYC and Vancouver. Our hotel was in a China town type place, where my admiration for Asians grew some more as some of the best hustlers on the planet. Chinese people they go hard! I think that's probably the best description. Abby, Ali, Dom and I went with Adolpho(a teammate of Dom's) We made it down there pretty much for the night time. So that's all I'm going to talk about. The club was kinda crackin, and what I mean by kinda crackin, I mean it was one of the most fun clubs I've attended. We rolled VIP, a lot of Dom's teammates came through, and the DJ was as good if not better than any DJ in the US, and the music was almost completely all in English. I made a couple of new friends even though communicating was hard. It's hard to hear someone in the club when you speak the same language, but trying to decipher another language when you can barely hear anything is pretty hard. Anyway, that's all there is about that, it was a great time and below are some pics from the night with new and old friends.




Remember I only hang out with beasts. Ali Dodson is no exception to this rule. The most amazing thing about this night was that we partied it up and didnt leave the club until about 5am... And yes we went HARD!!!! How about the fact that Ali had to leave for the airport at about 8am for a flight across the Atlantic... SALTY!!!!

Salamanca and the final game

So Day 1 in Spain, Abby, Ali and myself went to a college town about a little more than an hour outside of Plasencia. It is actually the home of the universidad de Salamanca. It's like the Yale or Harvard/Oxford or Cambridge of Spain. So, we went there and just walked around and did some shopping, and even though I thought I was going to hate the shopping part, I actually kind of enjoyed it. Below are pictures of Salamanca...



Later we went back to Plasencia for Dom's final basketball game. I sat next to this super fan, who was kind of out of control. The constant drums and whistles made it quite different than a game in the US. Also the game was MUCH more physical than the US game. I actually liked it much better than the US game. Well anyway, it was the 3rd game of a best of 5 playoff series, and my friends team was down 0-2 and they ended up losing by 1 point, and obviously were swept. Below are pictures from the game



After the game a bunch of team members came to my friend's apartment and we went out and hit the town pretty hard. We ended up meeting a couple of players from the other team, and hung out with two Americans real tough, one was from Baton Rouge and one was from Philadelphia. It was interesting, the nights start late and go late around here, so I don't think we went to sleep until around 7am or so. The night actually ended with us leaving Dom's teammate Kris' apartment RIGHT before the police came. This was right after his next door neighbor cursed us out for being too loud. Fun times! Below are pictures from the night out

waiting...

Waiting at the airport in NYC:
So if I could pick one word to describe my first day in Spain it would be waiting... So in the infinite wisdom of a group of attorneys, I was informed to arrive at the airport in NYC around two hours before my flight. I guess this was under the assumption that it would take approximately an hour to an hour and a half to get through the airport. However, it took probably about 7 minutes to get my boarding pass and pass through security. I would take responsibility for this, however it probably because there were no lines. But whatever, that was fine, I occupied my time by walking back and forth on ghcat in the terminal, and spending way too long looking for a book to read.

The Plane:
So the ride was fine. I wish I could say I slept the entire time, but every time I tried to get to sleep the girl sitting next to me would accidentally push my arm off of the arm rest, or do something like kick my leg. The food however was decent, and I definitely at the pushing and kicking girl's cheesecake. I do have to say though this flight was not near as comfortable as I thought it would be and the food was only marginally good, but I was STARVING so i went to town.

The Airport and Metro in Madrid:
So the airport in Madrid wasn't too crazy, just another airport... Get your passport stamped, Go to baggage claim, get your bags, and leave. I had quite a day ahead of me, I needed travel via metro to the train station, then from the train station to Plasencia. So I eventually find the metro station, which would have been easier if I would have just followed the signs to "metro" instead of walking outside of the airport. I get on, have a transfers arrive at the train station, no big deal. Remember I'm pretty good when it comes to public transportation.

Waiting at the Train Station in Madrid
So I arrive at the train station a little over an hour and a half ahead. And special note Spanish people don't really eat breakfast so there was no real food I wanted, the croissant and coffee just didnt look appealing and i wasn't starving at that point. So I walk around the station, inside and out. Hang out outside for"fresh air" where everyone is smoking like crazy, go back inside and wander some more, eventually I found a little atrium type place spot where I walked back and forth at. I eventually got the track for my train made it there and walked onto my train.

The Train Ride:
The train ride was cool. Surprisingly the Spanish countryside really isn't that nice looking. It was nice to look at for about an hour. Then I realized that similar to most traveling I do, I didn't really want anyone to talk to me. So I put in my ipod and went to town on the book my Dad told me to buy. It was cool, then some old man who was HELLA friendly sat next to me. He didnt talk to me, probably because I had my ipod in, but he did offer me an apple, and his newspaper. He seemed VERY friendly, but I was tired and at that point had no confidence in my Spanish. (PS the Spain version of Spanish is much harder to understand than the Latin American Spanish, I'm unsure what it is about it)

Waiting at the Train Station in Plasencia:
This was the worst part of the trip by far. So I arrive at my destination with no hiccups. The problem comes up now. My friends who I'm staying with for whatever reason were approximately 3 hours outside of Plasencia in Sevilla when I arrived. So all I can do is wait. The seats arent too comfortable in this train station to sleep. I did meet this guy who needed money probably for drugs, but he had a compelling story about getting off at the wrong station and he needed help getting to where he was trying to go. I did something I'd never do in the US, but I think I was delirious from the red eye and just gave him 10 euros to leave me alone. Of course he came back an hour later and proceeded to have a conversation with me, where I pseudo counseled him in Spanish.(I got skills, you don't have to tell me this)

Waiting in Plasencia:
So my friends eventually pick me up, and apologize and promise to make it up to me. I go to my friends basketball practice. I get there and the tiredness hits me. I remember what my german friend Miriam told me that I needed to work out to avoid jet lag. So I hit the track, which was complete with missing rubber where concrete was showing and some patches with mismatched rubber for the track. I jog a little bit, hit some abs, do some drills, watch some super strong looking girl look incredibly unexplosive on the runway doing LJ and TJ stuff. I finish all my stuff and just wait on the track for my friend to finish bball practice. My friend finishes practice early and we eventually make it to dinner, which I'll go into on another blog.

Random thought number one:
Hanging out with the group of attorneys was refreshing. Being with upper 20s who are not married, don't have kids, and still enjoy going out and having fun... So different from Nashville

Random thought number two:
I was able to psuedo counsel a man when I could hardly understand what he was saying. hmmmm....

Here we go again...

So yes, the one and only James Beck is at it again. Summer has hit me and I've decided to take a trip outside of the confines of North America. One week adventure in Spain. Currently I'm in in NYC awaiting for tomorrow when I embark on the only 7 hour flight to Madrid, where a 2 hour train ride awaits me to Plasencia. I'm REALLY excited because if you remember from before my weird obsession with public transportation, I get to take their subway system to the train station then the train to Plasencia. Now as the big day awaits me, I have a few of thoughts... Here they go:

1. I wish I would have done those Spanish worksheets I bought over Christmas break.

2. I wish I would have talked to Luci in Spanish on a regular basis.

3. I wish I would have continued watching TV in Spanish.

4. Special shout out to Erica Alexis, this is another attempt to try to get on your level.

5. Special shout out to Gina Frieden and Heather Smith for allowing me to graduate

6. Shout out to the silly academic system for not having people go to school in the summer

7. Another shout out to the two jobs that didn't want me to interview, because interviewing for those jobs would have run a risk of keeping me away from this trip.

8. Special shout out to my hosts around the world, without them this trip wouldn't have been possible.