Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Death Breath & Chatty Cathy & Bizcas, Scooters, Graffiti, Colón, and My Señora

As I am starting to acclimate to my new home I have come across a few interesting people/places/things AKA "nouns" so far. Each one is unique and interesting all at the same time. For sake of organization I will make a list of each of these "nouns" I have in the title.

1. Death Breath & Chatty Cathy & Bizcas

These three things are the people that are in my intensive Spanish class.

Death Breath is so friendly and helpful, but as her new nickname explains...she has breath of death. Because we sit on the side of the classroom, her direct air movement is in my direction. Barf...

Chatty Cathy is also very nice, but everything that is written up on the board she whispers "quietly" to herself. It is a small frickin classroom and me, sitting 2 seats over, can hear all of her "internal" conversation. I honestly wonder if she can't hear herself.

Bizcas have become entertainment for me over the past few days. These girls obviously have a huge stick up their bums and its called entitled spanish learning slooots. Whenever anyone, mostly me, makes a mistake in class their eyes roll around in their heads as though they are not even connected. I feel like going up to them and letting them know that if they keep doing that they are gonna go cross-eyed - hence the name, bizcas.

The building where my Spanish class is held

2. Scooters

With a population of about 230,000 people, there must be about double that amount driving around. I would have thought that the advancement of technology would also translate to the scooter world, but I think I was wrong. These things emit toxic gasoline smells, they sound like a billion flies, and they cause their drivers to drive absolutely horrible.

I have only been in this city for one week and I can't even count the times I have looked both ways on the street and then found my self jumping back because some dummkopf came out of no where.

This is a photo of a dumb scooter that hit the back of a car. I think I captured the emotion of the driver quite well LOL.

3. Graffiti

The city is pretty much covered with tags and some rather crappy artistic murals of graffiti. I think it makes the city looked much more run-down than it is, but it also adds character. People tag the funniest things and add the weirdest stuff to advertisements and signs.

My favorite tag was on suggested stretches in the Garcia Federico Lorca Park. All around the park they have signs that have stretches on them...and all of them are tagged. It might just be my immature humor, but they are all really funny. These photos are taken from the street close to my house and the park.





4. Colón

After elementary school I thought it wasn't popular to think Christopher Columbus was cool...apparently Spain did not get the message. The main meeting spot for our AIFS group is at the Plaza Isabela la Catolica (photo below). My professor talks about Colón as though he saved the New World from savages. It always makes me laugh.



5. My Señora

To my luck I was placed in a vegetarian house. My roommate and house mother are strict vegetarians and I...waver...Besides that, I am loving the much broader vegetarian food my Señora makes that I never thought of. As I am getting to know her better I have come to the conclusion she is a hippie. She does everything almost all-natural and her exercise consists of Yoga and Tai Chi. During one dinner conversation we talked about the effectiveness of positive thinking. At another dinner conversation we discussed the techniques of breathing and how it rejuvenates the body.

I haven't been able to sneak any creeper pix of her yet...but hopefully one of these days. She is the cutest thing and comes up to my shoulder.

1 comment:

  1. Ah, some of those pictures look very familiar, namely the statue of Cristobal Colon. Although graffiti, definitely a lot of it.

    I'm pretty jealous.

    ReplyDelete