Spanish Fire Marks.

When I was a young girl, my father introduced me to firemarks. What's a firemark, you ask? In the early days, people would contract with an insurance agency to have their homes protected against fire. The insurance agency would post their firemark on the home, and if a fire broke out, they would fight it. If the house next door caught on fire and wasn't insured by the same company, they would let it burn. Brutal!

Eventually, cities and counties took on the burden of fighting fires, every home received equal treatment, and firemarks went the way of the dodo bird. They can still be found in certain areas of the country - we found some in Philadelphia in historic areas, for example. But they are hard to find, even in antique shops.

When we were in Toledo, Spain, we found a home with a firemark. We don't know if they have the same system as we used to have, but we thought it was intriguing.

It says (basically) "Assurance from Fires." I would like to find a history of firemarks in Spain . . . someday maybe I can put Diana to researching it :)

How Dry I Am.

I just spent a week in the mountains, and the weather conditions are just plain scary. First, when we arrived the oak and aspen trees were not even leafed out. They are very late . . . usually they are budding out in early May. The apple trees were just blooming; the Lady's Slippers hadn't even come up (though they may have died because it got so cold this year); some of the very early flowers were not blooming.

To add to the weirdness, the stream was as low as it is in September. By this time, the spring run-off should be in full swing. Unfortunately, there was no run-off. The run-off happened so early, it barely affected the stream flow gauge that we follow.

Finally, the wind was blowing more than I have ever experienced in the high country. The first night I was there, the wind blew hard all night long . . . I have never known that to happen. And it blew the whole week. The pine pollen was "poofing" from the trees in quantities that turned the porch floor yellow. The wind brought in hot air . . . and lots of it. Which dried out the forest floor even more.

I am relieved that the Forest Service is watching so closely, and I hope they put a fire restriction on campfires. They see that the forest is scary dry . . . I pray that no one does something stupid.

Oh to be a Young Spaniard!

Diana couldn't wait to take us for Churros, which is a Spanish-style donut that is dipped in a thick hot chocolate. So Saturday morning, before we went to the Alhambra, we left about 7:30 a.m. to get churros.

When we left the hotel, I saw a group of about 15 young people (20-somethings, probably), dressed up in nice dresses and suits, headed down the street. I asked Di if they were going to work, or if they had been out all night. She suggested that perhaps they had been out all night, but she didn't exactly know. And we headed toward the Churro place.

When we got there, a large group of young men was seated around a table. It was obvious THEY had been up all night, and although they were probably drunk, they were not particularly rowdy nor obnoxious. Within a few minutes of our getting our churros, the dressed-up group arrived. Up close, it was easy to tell, they too had been out all night. They sat down for churros, too.

Not long after, a group of girls, all dressed in matching t-shirts came into the plaza. They were dressed like Indiana Jones, and one of the girls had on a veil. Diana explained that the bachelorette parties are all-day/all-night affairs, where the bride-to-be wears a veil, everyone dresses alike, and they make the brides do crazy things. They pulled up several tables and ordered their churros.

Within five minutes, another group, mostly guys but with one girl who wore her "bride-to-be" sash walked in to get their churros. And then a group of guys, very obviously a bachelor party, came in. Before we left, the plaza was entirely full of young people, all eating churros and having a great time!

Throughout the day, we saw several bachelor and bachelorette parties going on. In one "double bachelorette" party, the girls had funny make-up all over their faces, they were wearing white netting, and at that particular time, in the middle of the plaza, they were playing a game where they had a grapefruit in a stocking that was tied to their backside so that it could swing between their legs, and they had to hit another grapefruit that was on the ground along a path to the finish line. For one bachelor party, the boys all had on viking hats, except one guy was wearing a cow's hat. I am told the boys have to do crazy things such as sing a song in the plaza, beg for money, or kiss a stranger. My major regret is not getting a picture of one of the groups!

I was also told that some of these parties are held the day before the wedding. Can you imagine having a wedding ceremony after something like this? It doesn't sound like a positive way to begin a marriage.

It was really fun watching the young people during their parties. They were not loud or obnoxious - just funny. Oh to be young!

More Reveling at San Isidro

As we wandered around Madrid during the festival, we came upon a ballroom dancing site. They had erected a stage for a concert, but before the concert began, they were playing traditional Spanish music, and the Spaniards were dancing to the music. In some ways, it reminded me of being at a Garth Brooks Concert - not the dancing, but the fact that all of the people were singing the songs. As they danced they sang, and those that were not dancing, sang along, too.

We were lucky to come upon a group of four couples, about our age or slightly older, who clearly enjoyed dancing and knew what they were doing. Watching them was so much fun! No waltz, fox trot, or cha cha for them . . . they were doing traditional Spanish dancing. One dance was particularly fascinating. The man never moved his feet but instead turned on one foot while his partner danced around him. We never did figure out how he turned, because his partner wasn't pulling him around - or if she was, it was effortless. But it was a beautiful dance with really interesting technique.

Other activities included clowns and mimes, concerts, and walking. Apparently, on Sundays, walking is what the people of Madrid do. Paseando, is what it is called, technically "passing by" in English. During the Festival of San Isidro, we had a lot of "paseando" to do.

The Festival of San Isidro

While in Madrid, we had the privilege of celebrating the Festival of San Isidro. Google tells me that is the celebration of the city's bullfighting season. I didn't know exactly what we were celebrating, but it was much fun watching the way Madrilenans party!

On this day, the people of the city dress in the old traditional Spanish dress. Many of the women were wearing long dresses, white scarves on their heads, with a flower in their hair. A few had on shorter dresses, with a mantilla and flowers on their heads, and even fewer were wearing the Andalucian flamenco dresses.

The men wore traditional black-and-white checked jackets with a white or black boutonniere and a black-and-white cap. Even little children were dressed up for the day.

Much of the festival reminded me of the Riverfest here in Wichita. We went to the main area down near the river where the locals were gathering to picnic. There was a large flea market with a few food tents, but most of the people were bringing their own food. They would scatter around the park to eat, and since it is legal to drink on the streets, some were drinking beer. In Spain, however, it is considered to rude to walk around while eating, so no one was wandering the streets with drinks in hand. That limited litter and messiness, which I think would be nice for us to consider in the US.

I also noticed a distinct lack of port-a-potties or available restrooms. Don't Spaniards need to go to the bathroom? I have no idea where they went, and luckily we didn't need to find out!

Ray's Heraldo!

The common thinking among educators is that children need to be exposed to other languages before the age of twelve, because the brain catches the sounds much better. After that age, the receptors in the brain close off, and it is much harder to hear and say the sounds. I have long believed it to be true, and our trip to Spain confirmed it.

Don was not exposed to Spanish when he was young; I think it wasn't until he met me that he paid much attention. In our 35 years of marriage, he has never had much occasion to pronounce Spanish, and when he did, he tried hard, but it was very difficult for him. So when we went to Spain, I knew it would be a challenge.

In Sevilla, the main tower next to the cathedral is called the Giralda.

Don had no trouble pronouncing that word . . . he was very proud.

Later that day, which was the warmest day we had had, we decided to get some ice cream - helado in Spanish. Near our hotel was a delightful ice cream store named Raya's (pronounced rye-as). It was similar to some of the ice cream stores here, except all of the "stuff" is already on top of the ice cream, and they scoop it out into a cup (taza). Unfortunately, Don struggled with saying helado, and Raya's was beyond possibilities. So what came out was Ray's Heralda. So for the rest of the trip, when we were searching for ice cream, we instead said, "We want some Ray's Heralda." And no matter what we called it, it tasted really good!

Spanish Trains Rock . . . and they don't even rock!

Neither Don nor I had been to Spain before, so we had no idea of what to expect. I think we both thought it would be similar to Italy, and in some respects it was. But the Spanish train and metro are much superior to any other public transit system we have ever ridden.

We took six or seven long train rides - from Madrid to Cordoba (2 hours); Cordoba to Seville (2 hours); Seville to Granada (4 hours); Granada to Madrid (5 hours); Madrid to Toledo and to Segovia (both 30 minutes). All of the trains were absolutely clean. The riders were courteous (cell phone talkers went to the area between cars to talk, for example), some of the trains had a cafe car, and the train blitzed along sometimes at more than 120 miles per hour. And they ran on time. Exactly on time. Not one train was late.

Although the Granada to Madrid train was not considered a high-speed train, it certainly seemed fast to us. It made a few stops on the way, but certainly nothing like the trains in the US. We ride the train back and forth to New Mexico at times. Now that is a slow train! The Spanish trains put our US system to shame.

The train to Segovia is new. The previous train trip or bus trip would take 2 hours, since they both had to wind through the mountains. But the high-speed train goes through the mountains in two long tunnels that shorten the trip to 30 minutes. Delightful!

The metro is equally clean and fast. Although the cars were sometimes jammed, they were clean and nice, and unless a street performer or beggar would get on the car and sing to us (highly annoying because then he would beg for money), they were wonderful. Some of the newer cars are even air-conditioned.

I know that Spain has invested a lot of money in the infrastructure for their mass-transit system, but we applaud them for it. It was such a pleasure traveling through Spain in such nice style!