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Boy, when it rains, it pours in Gandia! And when it pours, everyone is riding the car… imagine the traffic jam in these tiny streets. Yesterday was another rainy day (the second one since we arrived) so I took the bus to downtown to shop at Charcuteria San Nicola’s, a very good delicatessen store Hugo recommended. It sells high quality local meat and cheese products and imported fine food and wine. Hugo was right; the lomo embochado (cerdo iberico, a Spanish salami with no taste and smell of artificial curing) and also famous jamon iberico (salt-cured ham that you notice ubiquitously dangling on the walls of the stores including at the airports), tasted incredibly exquisite – the cost is the main limiting factor consuming these delicacies for jamon costing up to $2,000 per leg, or a cruel $160 per pound (mine cost only 135 euros per kilo)! I ended up purchasing ¼ pound of each for a treat. Afterwards, I came to swimming pool by bus (normally I would walk) and had to sit indoors to avoid the rain. I began writing this entry while my throat burning from the intense chlorine fume.

The rain continued hard through the night (which kept me awake on and off) and the next day. We could see the Mediterranean had swollen big with the strong eastward winds (it looked murky half-way into the sea). Because today is another fiesta, kids are swimming early. Yunus decided to ride the bike and Dilara and I took the bus. On the way, we passed by the Riu Serpis (snake river) and noticed it has flooded with muddy water carrying along tree branches and garbage. This river is normally completely dry and we had not seen a drop of water there either June or this time – we even joked about if its waterless large groove were ever filled with water before. Nonetheless, this wave of floods in Spain has continuously been reported since we arrived. Last week, Seville was on the news about being hit with heavy rains resulting in damage and loss of lives from flooding and now Denia, the town 20 miles south of us where my friend Susan lives, is under flood. They say this much rain at this time of the year is not normal in Gandia – effects of global warming?

When we reached the sports complex, we noticed a group of men, who looked like Northern African descent, leaving (because of the proximity, the coastal Spain probably has a relatively high population of Africans; we noticed this while visiting southern France, too). They were dressed in long white outfits and Muslim headgears. Since this was the first time we were there early in the morning, I am not sure if this gathering was done on a regular basis or for the holiday of the Muslim religion that is happening now. I also don’t know what part of the complex they would hold such gathering and how it is possible to do such thing for the facility is run by the city government. These are the intricacies of life here that I might never come to learn due to the language barrier. Anyways, swim practice today was only 1 hour 15 min and Yunus rode his bike back home. He arrived 20 min before us but he was drenched for it poured whole bunch again.

If you were wondering, they do recycle here. With all the perils of consumption economy, they do produce lots of plastic, aluminum and glass container waste. Recycling bins, separated for various categories, are conveniently installed around the town. We have one by our supermarket Mercadona. Regular garbage containers for household disposal are plentiful and they have a good distribution of small garbage containers throughout the city. There are also custodial employees who sweep the streets frequently. These might be some of the reasons why the city looks pretty clean – except the frequent sights of doggy-dos, of course! There seems to be an effort to encourage people to go green (hurray for Al Gore by the way for his Nobel Peace Prize 2007!) with billboard and TV ads but I do not see too many windmills around (maybe not enough wind year-round) or sun power panels on the roofs. This apartment complex still uses gas even though it was built pretty recently.

To get to the pool, we ride our bikes on a road that is lined with orange and banana trees on one side. Along the other side, most houses are still in Mediterranean Villa style but the intense activity to convert them into multi-block apartment complexes (such as ours) is hard to miss. The famous Valencia naranjas on the trees are approaching to ripen. One of the swim dad’s is in orange business. He (all in Spanish with minimal help in translation by Susan) told me that even Del Monte is getting their oranges from the producers here. They are supplying to many countries in Europe and currently in the process of securing a deal with Russia. Before coming here, we knew how famous Valencia oranges were, but since arriving we have not had any freshly squeezed oranges! When I asked him why, he said that until oranges ready here, fresh oranges and juices come from South America or Africa. Apparently, our oranges will be ready towards the end of October. I wonder if this monsoon will affect the oranges on the trees.

The facility, Polideportiva Gandia Municipal, where the swimming pool is located, offers many different sports activities. I believe official Gandia sports teams are a part of this institution. The Gandia basketball team, Gandia Basquet, is supposed to be pretty good in this area and we suspect there are a couple of US African American players in the team. One day, Haluk and I watched the youth soccer practices; they were pretty good – the soccer is natural to the Europeans for they watch great quality of matches every weekend. In addition to team sports, the facility offers classes in martial arts, gymnastics, skating, fencing, tennis, aerobics, etc. There are two 25-meter swimming pools – one is indoor and the other is convertible. The kids practice in the convertible pool now but the meets are held in the indoor one (currently under construction). There is also a gym (where kids do weight training and stretching) but equipment needs a bit updating. For 80 euros, we got a 6-month family membership, which allows us to use all the facilities and get discounts on classes offered. I have started running on the track every other day while the kids are swimming – with all the walking and grocery carrying, my snug fitting clothes have already been loosened up. This week, the track field has, all of a sudden, become very busy with students (from elementary to university age) and adults. These people take their training very seriously. It is pretty inspiring to observe them workout in groups. In the meantime, the triathlon team also began training using the track field and the pool. The pool is apparently open until 11 and there is a guard on duty during these times. These people seem to go to sleep late – healthy or not. I heard there are other groups of sports activities in the town, such as trekking, mountain biking, hiking, sailing and surfing, that are privately offered . Even though one notices an incredibly large number of youth smoking in public, there seems to be considerable number of people involved in sports as well. You may even find more exotic exercise offerings such as Pilates and Yoga.

I am told that the Spanish are renowned for their love of fiesta. Well as I said, today is another fiesta here – Spanish National Day (Día de la Hispanidad, commemorates the historic re-unification of Spain, and also Christopher Columbus's first successful voyage from Spain to the Americas in 1492!). This means all the schools and businesses are closed again. Last Tuesday was Valencia Regional Day and the Monday October 8th became a bridge day. Consequently, the schools and businesses were in session only for two days this week! If you include the Fira I Festes, we have been having fiesta since we arrived!!! So far the official holidays in this area are as follows (there maybe unofficial once that I don’t know, yet!):

9/28-3/10 Fira i Festes
10/9 Valencia Regional Day
10/12 Spanish National Day
11/1 All Saints Day
12/6 Constitution day
12/8 Feast of Immaculate Conception
12/25 Christmas
12/26 Sant Esteve (Boxing Day)
1/1 New Year’s Day
1/6 Epiphany
1/22 San Vincente Martir (only in Valencia)
3/19 San Jose
Friday before Easter - Good Friday
Easter Monday
8 days after Easter Sunday - San Vincente Ferre
9th Sunday after Easter - Corpus Christi
5/1 Labor Day
8/15 - Feast of The assumption

In addition to the fiestas, siestas have been somewhat impediments to our lives here. By the time Yunus and Dilara are done with their schoolwork, the siesta begins (2-5 pm). This means if we wanted to visit the museums or do shopping in specialty stores, tough luck: they are closed. By the time they are opened, kids are getting ready for swimming. Students here go to school between 9 am and 1 pm; then they take a siesta and go back to classes again 3-5 pm. Anyhow, we stopped being Don Quixote and surrendered (doesn’t sound like me, does it?), so we are changing our schedule around the siesta times and taking one more step to blend with the culture. I believe having trouble in finding good food to eat has been a bigger motivation than our willingness to participate in culture and tradition! :=) Most restaurants serve food between 2-5 pm (this is what they call dinner here) and after 8 pm again – except fast food kind of places.

The local channel news coverage is pretty extensive and current. Yesterday, we watched the Ohio school shooting, Doris Lessing interview on her winning Nobel Prize in literature, a night club raid to catch Romanian and Russian mafia in Burrinana (Susan told me that there is lots of black money in Spain; that's why most businesses are done by cash), a lady swimming across Gibraltar from Spain to Morocco in 4h 45 min (this had something to do with breast cancer but I could not understand the details), the news about the well-being of the baby, Maria, who underwent the fetal surgery few months ago to correct spinal bifida first time in Europe. She was operated by the Spanish doctors in Seville with the guidance from Brazilian and American specialists. When we get better in Spanish, hopefully we will be interpreting events more correctly…

Well, I will conclude this entry with a revelation: after the kids left for swimming the other day, I was left sitting at the bus stop. Suddenly the audacity of this project weighed on me!! We are here in a land that we don’t know and communicating in a language that we don’t understand. I just let my kids take off by themselves under these circumstances while they have only occasionally done such thing in our own neighborhood. It is such a scary feeling to realize that if anything bad happened to them, how can I ask for help? How can they protect themselves? Maybe ignorance is really bliss. I also better appreciated the helplessness of those people who were probably a lot less equipped than we are (with education and information) and left their homes for better life in foreign countries. Without language, life is pretty limiting and terribly frustrating. I don’t know if I will ever reach the proficiency of explaining myself intellectually well in Spanish, but this is a good start and I am eternally indebted to Haluk for giving us this opportunity.

Adios para ahora.

PS: Perdone inconveniencia par favor para boca abajo las fotografias en este blog. Other than keep taking horizontal pictures, I don’t know how to solve the lopsided-picture problem, yet. So tilt your heads or computer screens for now… :=)
Dilara in the pool