Splurge

I am drinking a very good glass of tempranillo (red wine) that cost €2.20 or something, while desperately trying to concentrate on my lesson plan for tomorrow. How to teach when to use continuous form or gerund of a verb instead of the simple verb, or the infinitive.

I went to Corte Ingles (department store with a supermarket - upstairs you get clothes, nailpolish and grande mantones, large beautiful embroidered shawls, downstairs, food, towels and sewing supplies) and stocked up, because I'd just gotten paid by Marcelino for one lesson, and I had nothing in the fridge. I bought some salchichon iberico on sale (big piece of sausage made of special pig), wakame, jar of sardines, and a few other things, like long green peppers meant for frying.

I got back from Jerez at 3:45 and had to figure myself out before going to teach Marcelino. He seems very formal in his business suit but is very nice and walked me back after class to get a break from being indoors working constantly. As usual, a short a and u sound are difficult to tell apart, as are a th and a d. I enjoy working on pronunciation, because I think it is neglected but people have a hard time hearing effectively, if they cannot distinguish two sounds that to them are very similar.

Jerez unfortunately seems to be the center of my universe. I got there Sunday, and spent a while decompressing from the stress of teaching here, and the situation in my apartment. It is so quiet and relaxing there. It is a magic place and I never want to leave once I go there.
Jill, a professional flute player from Vancouver who has recently got into flamenco, very generously invited me to stay with her in her hotel. She arrived several hours after I got there and after I'd had a chance to relax and have a siesta. I showed her around and then we met Salome and had tapas, and both of them went to the Teatro Villamarta for a show. I was not so interested in the show and could not have afforded it anyways. I went for a walk and then sat in Bar Arriate, a legendary flamenco place where music happens spontaneously, but usually after midnight. I read about the absolute havoc that is happening in Jerez, as far as politics and economics (police not being paid, protesting by burning tires and effigies) and other completely loco things. I finally started talking to the three guys that own or work there, who told me where the late show was.
I ran into Andrew from Vancouver, and after the show, Hiro, who lives in Granada now, and then some Japanese friends of Salome. The girls went to bed, and I went out with the Japanese girls and a Dutch woman. We had to take a taxi to get way out to a pena where Nino Jero and Luis El Zambo were performing. I couldn't believe how good Oloroso seco de Jerez is, when you have it in Jerez instead of Sevilla (a golden coloured sherry, dry). The audience was highly Japanese, all the people from the festival had come. I saw Manu, back from Switzerland. Nino Jero is very renouned as a guitarist. Luis El Zambo is an incredibly intense and beautiful singer - a big man, but attractive. Nino Jero was in the strangest mischevous mood, and was grinning and making a Japanese girl in the front laugh in the middle of the Siguiriyas. I found him kind of distracting. He is so well known that he can do whatever he wants, I suppose. If it were up to me to judge, I'd say there was something going on with him and the Japanese girl.
Despite these funny things, it was an incredible show, and I felt again that this is my place. I want to be here. In Jerez, not Sevilla.

Monday was relaxed. Jill and I slept in late. I helped her look for flamenco shoes and find her way around town. We had a late siesta, and then Salome came knocking on the door, dragging Jill out to a dance class. Salome is a very busy working mother in Vancouver, and does not have too much time to herself. I admire the way she is just going for it, doing everything, seeing all the shows, going to tons of dance classes - giving this holiday all she has got. She looks happy and energetic.
I went off to meet Geoff, an Irish/English guy with a place in Jerez. I'd contacted him about "couchsurfing" before Jill told me she'd rented a hotel with two beds. He said let's meet anyways. After Jill's class, she came and we all went to Geoffrey's house, and had a great evening drinking wine and shooting the breezes; don't know what else to call it. Meeting new, cool people.
This morning just before I left, Jill and I ran into Kiko, back again from France, who spoke to us in a mischevous mixture of 5 different languages, and Julz, the London hip hop/breakdance/flamenco/capoeira/metal artist.

I made sure to have breakfast of molletes con tomate y aceite and coffee both mornings. How completely satisfying to sit by the market on a sunny and slightly misty morning and have a huge dose of olive oil with pureed tomatoes on "molletes"...

Things are going better at home too. "La piedra" as I was beginning to call her, initiated a talk with me this evening to make things smoother. I think she is really a decent person, but there is an enormous cultural and personality difference between us. Hopefully it will continue this way.

The only thing I need to do now is reconcile my life here in Sevilla with my desire and need to be in Jerez. I may need to travel there often. Jerez is what I am over here for.