American in Spain

Recently I was contacted by InterNations, an organization I registered my expat status with several years ago and have since been diligently ignoring all their newsletters about meet ups in Madrid. They asked if I’d like to do an interview with them and to be featured on their site. I agreed, but then life got complicated, and they ended up having to nag me several times, but we finally did the interview and they published it. They’ve given me permission to re-post it here for your enjoyment. Some of my regular readers might not know my answers to some of these basic questions.
(more…)

The other day, during my bidaily visit to the local grocer, my grocer and friend, Andrés, said, “Hey, Erik, come here for a second. I have something to give you.” From its hiding place behind some yogurt in the display fridge, he pulled out three strange fruit pods. He explained that they are called tamarinds, and that they are native to Africa and are sort of a cross between a peanut and a date. I had never heard of such a thing, but he instructed me on how to peel and eat them, warning that the seeds are very hard and to be careful.
(more…)

This past weekend, I found myself thinking about two very different kinds of knights, one that seems very old from thirty years ago, and some others from several centuries ago. Both coincided with a visit from my cousin Jeanie and her husband Kit. It’s rare that two anecdotes I have to share align with a common word, but in this case, I’ve got two stories of knights to tell you, and both have to do with quirks of Spanish history.
(more…)

The following is a document written by my father, Paul Rasmussen, about his trip to visit us in Spain in March 2013.

Tuesday and Wednesday

We dropped the dogs off at the kennel at 8:30 am, and an hour later we were at the Charlotte airport long-term parking lot. We flew to snowy Toronto, waited there for four hours, and boarded the flight to Dusseldorf around 5 pm. We landed in Germany at 6:20 am on Wednesday, enjoyed a croissant and coffee, and then waited three more hours for our flight to Bilbao. Our son Erik met us there, and an hour later we arrived at his home in Colindres.
(more…)

Two and a half years ago, we drove the seven minutes to the town of Limpias and very much enjoyed a walk along the river. I remember thinking at the time, “I should bring my parents here.” And last weekend, I did. The sky was clear and the sun was warming the cool spring air, and we decided to walk along the water in Limpias.

Limpias is positioned by where the Asón River begins to open up before spilling into the sea in Colindres, and Limpias still has a lot of artillery guarding the river entrance, presumably from the Spanish Civil War.
(more…)

I’m a big fan of clever street art, such as this mural, in nearby Santoña, that spans three buildings. The medieval Old Town section of nearby Laredo is both the most happening social zone of the town, and also the most derelict crumbling part, full of abandoned, disintegrating buildings. Just last month one of them blew over. So there are plenty of abandoned houses with boarded up windows. A year or two ago, some interesting paintings began appearing on some of the doors and windows of the Old Town, depicting women inside the houses looking out. More than once, I’ve done a double-take when walking by, because they seem so real.
(more…)

This weekend we finally got around to inviting our friends Agustín and Ana over so they could teach us how they make their Rice With Lobster dish that we had one time at their house. The day before, Ana and Marga went shopping to buy the lobster. The first fishmonger they visited had only one living lobster and some dead ones, so they went to another where they purchased two beautiful living lobsters. When they arrived on the day of the meal, they brought their paellera, a big dish for making paella, and their gas stove on which to heat the paellera evenly. These paelleras and stoves are sold at any Spanish hardware store and any self respecting Spanish household owns one. They also brought a lovely bottle of Riesling.
(more…)

Due to Easter falling early this year, the annual local children’s Carnival celebration fell during my annual February golf trip. I was quite disappointed, since I have very much enjoyed photographing the festival in past years. However, it has been raining pretty much nonstop for all of 2013, and the weather got particularly bad last Friday when they were scheduled to have their parade, so all the activity was kept indoors. There is some talk that they might try to do the parade later this week.
(more…)

My three-year-old daughter has been instructed by her teacher to bring in some old clothes that no longer fit for the Pelele celebration. According to this Spanish Wikipedia article, the Pelele is a rag doll or straw puppet that is thrown high up into the air by a group of women during the Carnival (Mardi Gras) celebrations in Madrid, while they sing about beating him to death. The doll is later burned. Ritual burnings are common in Europe around the solstices, as an ancient pagan symbol of rebirth. The symbolism of burning your old clothes is pretty straightforwardly similar, however, I suspect that the use of old clothes is more about getting straw into a humanoid shape. The real reason for the doll becomes apparent upon listening to the lyrics of the song.
(more…)

One of the unique cultural practices in Spain is the summer and winter double paycheck. Every July or August and December, Spanish employees receive twice their normal salary for the month. Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? It’s actually negotiated that way, so when you take a salaried job in Spain, you agree to receive your annual salary in 14 payments, one per month, and then an extra one each summer and winter. As far as I know, this is the standard practice across most industries.
(more…)