Inaugural (and long delayed) post

First of all, welcome. I am delighted that you can make it.

That's the opening to one of my favorite books, Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything.  But even though I can't claim the first few lines as mine, they are fitting for this as well.  I thank all of you for bearing with my sporadic morsels of news over the last few weeks as I arrived in Spain, arrived in Huelva, and got settled.  But settled I am, so now it's time for an encapsulation of my two plus weeks here in Europe, starting with my time in Madrid

The flight from Chicago went fine; other than the person in front of me, who reclined her seat eight minutes after takeoff and didn't unrecline until we arrived in Spain, it was comfortable enough.  I unfortunately didn't sleep at all.  I could have been awake for 72 hours in a row before that flight and it wouldn't have mattered; if I'm not laying down, I'm not falling asleep.  So, after about four hours of futility, I gave up on the notion and read a Spanish newspaper to reacclimate myself with the language.  It had been a long time, far too long, since I had been exposed to any sort of real Spanish and I was (and still am) nervous about how much I'd forgotten.  

We landed right on schedule in Madrid: 7:40 AM local time.  I gathered up my suitcases from the baggage carousel and waited for my friend's plane, which had been delayed in JFK.  Fortunately, it hadn't been delayed that long, and after a brief wait we found each other and headed for our hostel: Hostel One Centro, right next to the Puerta del Sol.

Like trickle-down economics, taking the metro to the hostel seemed like a good idea at the time; it saved money and dropped us off really close to the hostel's front door.  In the end, it turned out to be far more complicated and annoying than it looked and in the end was a terrible idea--also like trickle-down economics.  Trying to navigate a major metro system while dragging two suitcases and carrying a backpack is, and this may not come as a surprise, a very bad idea.  It's like wearing a sign that says, "I'm a tourist and vulnerable to theft."  Turns out some people can read that sign; my friend's wallet was stolen right out of her (zipped) purse.  Not the most auspicious start to 8 months in Spain.

Having had my wallet stolen in Spain the last time I was here, I know the feeling; having no money in a foreign country is a bad situation.  But the guy who ran our hostel was very nice and very sympathetic and let us delay payment until our last night, so she had some chance to get some money (the reservations were in her name and under her card).  In the meantime, I paid for what I could with the assurance that I would be reimbursed soon, which I was.  Thank goodness for Western Union money transfer and international cell phones.

I spent most of our first day in a half-asleep stupor, trying to stay awake long enough to get over the jet lag.  In this I succeeded, though it was a very long day.  But after twelve hours of sleep I woke up refreshed, and we passed a much more enjoyable day and evening generally exploring Madrid and its magnificent park, El Parque de Retiro.  We found a nice cafe in a mini-plaza that had deals on drinks and had three glasses of wine for six euro, after which we returned to the hostel and hung out with our Australian friends who we'd met there.

The next day was September 29, an innocuous date on the calendar that was anything but in Madrid.  Due to the tenuous economic situation that Spain, and to a lesser degree the rest of Europe, finds itself in, conflicts between workers and employers have become more rancorous lately as life for the former has been harder as the latter make cuts and drat unpopular regulations to try to stay afloat.  It came to a climax on the 29th.  Some organizations have reported that as much as 70% of Spain's work force went on strike.  I can't say exactly how many people were striking, but I can say that those who were were loud, destructive, and passionate about being loud and destructive.  I tried to use an ATM later in the day only to find that it had been spray-painted and smashed to the point of uselessness.  Moreover, the center of the huelga (strike) was in the Puerta del Sol, not more than 100 yards from our hostel, so we saw and heard everything.  An interesting day to be in Spain.  

The strike notwithstanding, we visited a modern art museum essentially for the sole purpose of seeing Picasso's justly famous Guernica.  I was reminded again, while strolling through the museum, how much modern artists can get away with.  An entire room was devoted to a pile of tires.  Another piece was simply a framed blue field (which was in fact my favorite piece in the museum for a while because, even if I didn't understand it, I like blue).  Fortunately for us and the Museo Reina Sofia, Guernica is worth the modest price of admission; an impressively  large and fascinating painting by one of Spain's all-time greats.

After the museum, we returned to the park and savored the peace for a while.  A Thai supper and a few glasses of sangria later, we returned to the hostel early to pack up and leave the next morning, me for Huelva, her for her orientation and then, a few days later, Zaragoza.  The prologue to my Spanish adventure was nearing its end.  I had no idea what would be in Chapter 1.