On language and pigs

One thing that has becoming glaringly obvious to me on this trip is the importance of language. I speak zero Spanish, and for whatever reason thought that would not be a problem when traveling to Spain (can we say egocentric American?). I didn´t even buy a freakin book of key Spanish phrases for christ´s sake. Anyways, I´ve found that it is a problem and while I´m really making an effort to try and pick up bits of Spanish here and there, it´s really hard to talk to anyone. And after awhile of "hablo ingles?", being the first thing out of my mouth, I start to feel like a moron for not being able to communicate even the simplest of things, like ordering from a menu, asking for and receiving directions, etc. Also, pretty much everyone in my Madrid hostel spoke Spanish, and Spanish only, except for a couple of people - Adriana, who was from Brazil, but now living in Los Angeles (she actually speaks Portugese, English and Spanish), and Gary, from Texas, who also speaks Spanish and is moving to Madrid to teach English. By the second day of being surrounded by people my age but totally unable to interact with them, I found that all I wanted to do was to go hang out in the English cafe/bookstore, where I could actually have a conversation with the girl there, who happens to be moving to San Francisco in two weeks (small world). That obviously defeats the purpose of traveling to foreign countries, which isn´t to go and find the one place that is familiar, but to actually experience something different.

So, by mid-afternoon of day three in Madrid, I decided to try and integrate myself. Feeling satisfied with the number of touristy stuff I had done, I set off on my own (up til then, Adriana had sort of been my translator). First I took the metro to go and buy a bus ticket to Barcelona. The metro in Madrid, is great and very easy to use, so by now I was pretty confident with it. And I must have looked confident and not like a tourist, because someone stopped to ask me for directions. I was psyched until I realized that I had no idea what he had said and all I could answer with was "no hablo espanol." Nonetheless, I managed to successfully buy my bus ticket speaking only in Spanish and hand gestures. Feeling like I deserved a reward, I set off to find a cervecceria (or bar/cafe). Finding one that looked pretty authentic, I walked in and sat down. There was bullfighting on TV and legs of pig hanging from the wall (I´ve found that ham, cheese and bread are pretty major staples of the diet here. So much so, that there was one restaurant that was called the bar de jamon, and served only stuff made from pig). Right, so anyways, I sit down at the bar and order. "Una cerveza, por favor." For some reason, when ordering a beer, you don´t have to specify. If you say una cerveza, you just get whatever´s on tap. My order got me not only a beer, but also an appetizer - two pieces of bread, one with tomato and mozarella and the other with pork (most likely coming from the pig´s leg hanging in front of me) and a slice of red pepper. (That´s another thing, when you order a drink here, you always get some kind of a snack, either what I got, chips, bread or nuts.) So I get my drink, am hanging out with the locals and watching bullfighting. The bartender proceeds to slice the pig´s leg hanging in front of me, but the portion he´s slicing has been cured, to some kind of bacon or something. He´s slicing all these little pieces onto a small plate, preparing the snack for his next client. He sees me watching and hands me a slice. I have to admit, by this time, with an entire pig´s leg (hoof and everything) hanging directly in front of me, the bullfighting on tv, which was just starting to turn bloody, and my pork and bread snack still untouched, the slice of cured pork (or whatever it was) was probably the least appetizing thing he could have handed me. But since it was a friendly gesture and I hadn´t received many of those, I forced myself to stomach it and stay for the rest of the bullfight (the bull lost). I then paid my bill ($1.50), thanked the guy (gracias is another word I know), and vowed never to eat pork again.