I met almost all of them when we went on a field trip sponsored by the city to a glacial lake (la laguna negra) up in the mountains, not far from Soria. However, my perception of "not far" is clearly very different from that of Spanish people. 25 minutes into our exhausting, painfully looong bus ride, with the daunting prospect of the 20 minute stretch that remained before the arrival to the Laguna, the bus stopped for a "15" minute coffee break.
We finally got to the lake after a perilous drive up the mountainside, and it was BEAUTIFUL. However, it was also FREEZING. I am sure it was below 0, and my 3 sweaters + huge scarf weren't doing much. I've been ill since the minute we left the Laguna and Dr. Simon has diagnosed me with laryngitis. In any case, we took a bunch of pictures, marveled at the pretty, and whined about the cold (that last part was mostly my contribution).
That same night, Erin, Simon and I hosted a potluck in our piso and invited all of the assistants. Hilarity ensued. Stephanie DeOrio (the chick in the sunglasses in the picture above, whom I've nicknamed Oreo, Cookie, and Cooks [although she really can't do the latter, as I am about to relay]) brought a bean dip. She soaked the beans for 12 hours. She didn't read the rest of the instructions. She left out the cooking part. Then, Francesca made coconut-mascarpone balls covered in melted chocolate and I ate all of them. Then, Candy brought brownies that were absolutely the most delicious brownies I have EVER EVER TASTED and so I ate all of them as well. Everyone told a fun fact about themselves and I feel as though I should relay a few of them due to their sheer madness: Steph got stabbed by an 8 year old once. Shane stole a gondola in Venice. Francesco got roofied. After almost all of the food had been consumed (including the most DIVINE mac n' cheese eveeeeer by Jessica [it had goat cheese and blue cheese in it YUM] and the most flavorful deviled eggs by Stephanie and have I mentioned CANDY'S BROWNIES?????? Seriously, all of the food was fantastic) we moved the party to Hormiga bar, where I proceeded to take a nap, which has turned into somewhat of a recurring phenomenon, unfortunately. You see, I have this condition - I believe the medical term for it is iSleep - that forces me to take brief naps in public. The doctors have yet to figure out what the trigger is. My friends believe it is the wine.
In other news, it is mushroom season in Soria, and everyone and their grandfather has been going mushroom picking. This week is mushroom tapas week. Every bar serves its own 1.50euro mushroom appetizer and we basically go from bar to bar and have a tapa and a tinto every day. I am loving it so much.
Besos,
Ésmadar.
P.S: When I started out this post with the declaration that "Soria is hilariously tiny", I was going somewhere, but I forgot to get there: for a over a month now, Erin and I have been waiting for our bank cards to arrive in the mail. Alvaro, the (hot) (but married) bank employee with whom we opened the account, has been looking for us to tell us the delay was due to his needing photocopies of our NIE cards. When we'd opened the account with him, we didn't have a land line or cellphone numbers yet, so he had to be creative when trying to get in touch with us. His creativity entailed telling pretty much the entire town that he needed me and Erin to come into the bank with our NIEs. The result: friends, acquaintances, and downright strangers stopping us in the streets to tell us that "Alvaro de Santander" needs to see us. Earlier today at school, a prof Erin claims to have never even seen before walked up to her and asked her in an urgent tone if she'd been to the bank with her NIE card yet. Can you imagine being a newcomer in Montreal and having strangers track you down to discuss your bank account business with you?? Soria is awesome.
B4 uSleep, uEat.
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh... Erin never told me the NIE story about the bank. THAT IS HILARIOUS! And, as usual, I loved your blog. You had me belly laughing.
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