Here's a quick post about my town, Salamanca, and some of the things I've been doing.
For the past few weeks the air's been a bit electric because Las Ferias, the city-wide fairs, were coming, and everywhere parades were being prepared, stages set up, etc... Here's a nice shot of the Plaza Mayor where they were setting up the stage and it was all windy and full of anticipation...
In every plaza in the city, and on a lot of street corners too, they're setting up casetas, these boxcar-looking bars where they sell a cania of cerveza (a little glass of beer) and some tapas for like 1.50 euros. Here's a guy painting his caseta:
And here's some more casetas:
And here's me and my roommate Evan (Far left) and my buddy Dave enjoying a cania at a caseta...
Later last week we went to go see a concert given by La Tuna, which, contrary to what you might think is neither a jam band nor a sea-shanty group. It's like this: think of the coolest a-capella group you could ever imagine joining, but only in the sense that it's a club that sings. What I mean is, they play instruments, not just singing, but they're a student group. Each facultad, or department, such as Law, History, Economics, Medicine, etc, has a grupo de La Tuna, and they wear period costumes from the 13th century, with each color of their vests corrseponding to their facultad (yellow for law, red for history, etc). The girl on stage is Maria Angela, one of the IES staffers, and they are serenading her.
The Tuna started sometime around the 13th century, when students started playing together in the plazas and streets of Salamanca for extra cash. It became formalized a few centuries later, and they would hire themselves out for private concerts too and play serenades for the girls who the guys in the group were chasing.
Their capes have ribbons and patches from all the places they've visited, as well as garters and silks from the women they are courting. They sang a bunch of great Spanish songs, including "Las Canarias" and others, and even some popular ones (for us Americans) like "Guantanamera" and "Cielito Lindo".
In the middle of the concert, the guys raised glasses of beers and sang this call-and-response brindis (toast), which I immediately made them teach me after the show:
Del cielo ha caido un grán garafón From the sky has fallen a huge carafe
Para los borrachos de esta reunion For all the drunks of this gathering
Bebiendo, bebiendo, nos Drinkin’, drinkin’, we’re getting cooked
vamos cociendo
Ya vé, ya vé, ya beber vino! Come on, come on drink wine!
Bebamos hasta que no nos conocimos,
O del culo now cayamos!
We drink until we don’t know each other,
Or until we fall on our asses!
Needless to say, it's now the IES kids' drinking anthem.
And finally, an artsy shot of me with cafe con leche and a cigarette in the Bar Sierra de Bejar which is the bar-cafe where my friends and I meet before we go out.
And a shot of me and boys and girls playing dominoes in the Calle de Toro:
And a shot of the Plaza de Toros, which is where I'm going tonight to see a bullfight. This graffiti says "Matadors are murderers". I beg to differ, but we'll see how I feel about it later...
More to come soon on the bullfights and on my recent trip to La Sierra de Francia, where I saw a sky-high convent and did some sweet ambling about on cliff-mounted rocks (scary pictures coming, mom!).
Also, in response to the one outstanding question, they do not have McPaella, but they do have McGazpacho and McFishsticks, which are called McMarins. Also, you can buy a glass of beer at McDonalds.
Love,
Robbie
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