Today is Kings Day, the traditional gift giving day in Catholic Spain. For people who prefer Christmas to be more about Baby Jesus than the North Pole, it makes more sense to give gifts on Epiphany, when tradition says that the Wise Men allegedly gave gifts to Jesus.
This morning, my mother-in-law articulated a concern I’ve been feeling but had yet to put into words:
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On Thanksgiving morning, as is tradition in my family, we piled in the minivan and headed over the proverbial river and through the proverbial woods to Grandmother’s house. Nora was relatively well behaved during the 3.5 hour car journey, which included a stop at Bojangles for a “bo berry biscuit”, which was priced at $0.89 for one or $1.00 for two…and Europeans ask why Americans overeat so much. Before leaving Bojangles, Nora managed to dump her entire cup of water down the front of her dress, which was immediately removed, thus clearing the way for getting chocolate all over her onesie later in the car ride.
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It’s that time of year again, time for wool sweaters and pumpkin carving. Like the previous two years, my friend Andrés hooked us up with a lovely gourd specimen to carve. Nora had a lot of fun with the pumpkin this year. We invited over our four-year-old neighbor, Oscar (who happens to be Andrés’ nephew), to participate in the autumnal festivities. I did get Oscar to put his hand into the pumpkin and feel the slimy innards once, but after that he preferred to play with Nora’s toys, which were all new to him, and watch from afar. He brought over his own little pumpkin to carve too, so Marga got her first carving experience, which she thoroughly enjoyed.
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When you live abroad, most customs that don’t match your own seem odd at first. Some traditions are pretty clearly worse, but the people practicing them don’t know any better; most are just different, neither better nor worse; and some are hands down superior to the customs in your own country, and it’s your compatriots back home that don’t know any better. Today I’m going to talk about a Spanish custom that falls into the latter category, being pretty clearly preferable to the tradition in my home country. It’s about who buys lunch or drinks or dinner on your birthday.
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This past weekend we went to Zaragoza for a wedding. The groom was Marga’s cousin, Manu, and the bride was named Irene, previously unknown to us. We left on Friday afternoon, stopping at a rest stop just before Haro, Rioja, for a half hour to meet up with my in-laws, so we could make the rest of the journey together. Marga spent five years at the University of Zaragoza, and she was excited to introduce me to the city.
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We began World Cup final Sunday evening by heading to nearby Laredo, where we’d heard there might be a big screen set up on the beach. We were certain that we couldn’t take a 15.5 month old child to an enclosed space with Spanish fans because she’d die of fright from all the screams. We discovered that the beach screen was only a rumor, and the real big screen was in the old town hall square. We took one look at how packed the square was with people and turned around and headed back towards Colindres, but not before spotting a group of old ladies wearing red-yellow-red striped headbands singing A Por Ellos.
Once back in our home town, we chose our favorite soccer-viewing bar, El Vapor (The Steam), which is only about two hundred meters from our house. The twin brother of our friend with the restaurant in Laredo was already seated at a prime table, and he informed us that he was leaving before the game began and promised us his table. We would spend the game outside on the sidewalk looking into the bar through the glass to a projected screen. And it was a good thing we were outside, because, well, let’s just say that inside the bar, it lived up to its name.
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We had another successful Hamburgerfest this year for July 4th, with friends Agustin, Ana, Ivan, Veronica, Manolo, Elena, José Luis, and Azucena attending. In 2009, we came up almost short on hamburger meat, so this year we decided to make sure that definitely didn’t happen. As a result, we have about eight hamburgers left over to freeze or eat this week. Nora was very well behaved with the guests once her initial “who are all these people in my living room??” confusion wore off. And they were very good about warming up to her slowly. Agustin fed her a pretty big portion of his dessert of flan, ice cream and whipped cream, which endeared him to her at least for the duration of the dessert course.
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For a week now I’ve been seeing signs around town advertising the “I Festival de Cerveza de Colindres“, but none of the signs said exactly what or where it was, just the dates, June 17 – 20 and the bars that were sponsoring the event. I sort of assumed that it was going to be some discount on beers in those bars or something, but yesterday we ran into a friend that informed us that it was a big festival with bands in a tent near the town hall. Unfortunately, it has been cold and rainy all week, but today, on the last day of the festival, we went to check it out. This is what we found…
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On June 12, 2010, shortly before the United States faced off against England in their first World Cup match of the second decade of the third millennium, we had a party to celebrate the ninetieth birthday of my third grandfather. It was a lovely meal with good friends and family followed by a balloon-popping event, some gifts, and cake. A good time was had by all, even if Nora did manage to receive more gifts than the birthday boy.
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