far too much writing, far too many photos

runswithscissors


Thursday, April 03, 2003

A friend has been staying here during the past couple of weeks, a bilingual American in the process of relocating from Pamplona to Madrid. Given that I spend a sizeable part of my days writing, and therefore thinking, in English, living alone has been a liability when it comes to developing my skills re: speaking Castellano. It's one thing to have the TV or radio on, absorbing Spanish that way. It's another thing to converse in Castellano, to have to think and respond to someone blathering at me. So having a speaker of the native lingo on premises has been a help. I mean, god bless this guy -- he answers my endless questions, he deals patiently with me fumbling about and spewing halting, mistake-riddled Español. And as a result of all that saintly forbearance, I've seen some real improvement in my conversational ability – slow and gradual, but real. Yesterday in particular. So I was feeling pretty good when I got to class yesterday evening, flush with the illusion that I would do just fine in the back and forth between high-level Spanish speakers. (HA!!)

In the process of getting a bit of perspective, I learned that in the written version of Spanish, the use of parentheses is looked down upon, is considered vulgar. Meaning not educated or proper. I remember hearing the same thing in writing classes in the States -- better to use dashes or find another way to do what you're wanting to do, parentheses are clumsy, ugly, low-class. And I've got to say, I love parentheses. I think they're useful and expressive. I use 'em regularly, both in this journal and in other, more (hopefully) commercially viable writing, as anyone who has read my stuff can attest. Vulgar? Low-class? Who cares! They're fun, if not overused to the point of bludgeoning an unprepared reader with parenthetical hooha. So they'll remain part of my pitiful arsenal of writing tools. (To anyone who might have a problem with that: deal.)

Meanwhile, the other student in the class is an American from San Francisco way, a character who has been living in Europe for a long time, spending a few years in one country teaching English, learning the native language, enjoying the local life, then heading to another country. So that he now speaks several languages. Man, I'm envious. I'd love to be multilingual. People who are fluent in more than one language, especially those with a bunch of 'em under their belt, are heroes to me.

Everyone needs their heroes, don't you think?

It's a perfect spring day here, the sunlight beginning to take on that quality it has for most of the warm season here, a real Spanish kind of light. A clear, blue sky overhead. The air's cool, there's a breeze, so the long-masted television antennas that have sprouted up from the roofs of the neighborhood buildings over the years move slightly back and forth in the blue air, as does laundry on clotheslines and the big 'NO a la GUERRA' sign hanging from the side of a building above the soon-to-be-ex-vacant-lot from here.

The sight of banners like that is not unusual here -- where the various recent polls indicate that nine out of ten Spaniards remain emphatically against the war, a figure that's held steady in recent weeks -- including rainbow-colored PAZ (peace) flags hanging from windows and homemade jobs with lots of variations on the basic theme. An especially visible concentration of them hang from balcones around the plaza down the street, the site of a large, apparently spontaneous demonstration last night. Loud, loud sounds of bombs falling, explosions and sirens signaled the start of the bugger, broadcast from a third or fourth floor piso on one side of the plaza, home to the owner of an impressive stereo system who has, on two or three occasions during the last couple of weeks, thrown open their French doors and played whatever it is they have -- something pre-recorded, something they've thrown together, I don't know -- at a volume that sends it out over the plaza and down various streets of the barrio. Crowds gather, milling about the plaza, staring up at the balcón, which last night gradually led to people banging on available surfaces as the soundscape continued, including many locals banging on pots and pans.

With time, voices and pots and pans became the predominant part of the mix, creating a huge ongoing cacophony (hooting, hollering, clinking, clattering, rattling, blanging, clanging), all signaling the continuing opposition to the conflict. An enormous amount of noise, hard to miss even if you're inside with music or the TV going. On and on it went, getting louder and louder. I opened a window and cast a glance around this little corner of the neighborhood. Couldn't see anyone else hanging from windows, but people streamed in and out of the plaza, and the din rose into the evening darkness.

I'd been in the middle of tossing together something to east. Finally decided I needed to put that on hold and go get an eyeful of the scene down the street. Pulled on a heavier shirt and a jacket, ran downstairs. As I stepped outside, I could hear that the noise had diminished and so ran to the plaza, hoping enough of the brouhaha remained in process that I could get a good first-hand feel of some fine communal wackiness. Folks still remained in the plaza, but the bulk of the crowd had exited through the pedestrian walkway that leads from the plaza's rear to the next east-west street over and were proceeding down the narrow north-south street that extends away from there, filling it both with a small sea of bodies and with the still-loud-but-slowly-diminishing sound of voices and pots/pans being banged.

The French doors remained open on the balcón that fronts the killer-sound-system piso, but no noise issued forth. Relative tranquility was reasserting itself around the plaza. People stood in groups talking, others clustered around bars or tiendas. Still others moved through the space, heading elsewhere or entering/exiting the Metro station.

Life has a funny habit of moving on. So I did the same, coming home to food and spirited second half of a game between the Spanish national soccer team and the Armenian team. The final: Spain 2, Armenia 0.

Just another Wednesday evening in Madrid.

rws 11:04 AM [+]
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BLATHERINGS

August 2001
September 2001
October 2001
November 2001
December 2001
January 2002
February 2002
March 2002
April 2002
May 2002
June 2002
July 2002
August 2002
September 2002
October 2002
November 2002
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October 2008
November 2008
December 2008
January 2009
February 2009
March 2009
April 2009
June 2009
July 2009

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MORE FOCUSED BLATHERINGS


Travels:
London '01
Pamplona
Italy '03
U.K. '03
Sevilla
Casablanca
Stoke-on-Trent
Barcelona
Québec/Ottawa
Boston/Lisbon/Madrid
Italy '04
Montréal
La Sierra

Events:
Madrid -- arrival
9/11
Emergency Room I
Holidays 2001
Holidays 2002
Holidays 2003
Holidays 2004
Holidays 2005
A neighbor's passing
Madrid -- March 11 bombings
  and aftermath
Emergency Room II
Israeli friend/Madrid Marathon
Madrid -- Royal Wedding
The DELE exam

GONE, a novel:
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10

THE BASTARD CHILDREN OF
JOE ROCCO, a novella:
-- Part 1
-- Part 2
-- Part 3

BURBANK SHRUGGED,
a screenplay:
-- Part 1
-- Part 2
-- Part 3
-- Part 4

Short stories:
Murphy's Wife
Another Autumn
La Queja de Una
  Hermanastra Muy Conocida

Autobiography
-- Personal History
-- Hormones On Parade
-- Accidents, Random Mishaps,
    Personal Problems

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .


OTHER SOURCES OF WHOLESOME ENTERTAINMENT

People/Weblogs:
dooce
foxvox
fudge it
fear not
rebekka
bookslut
802online
idle words
madhaiku
wockerjabby
grow-a-brain
rebel market
letting me be
out and about
kung fu grippe
fanatical apathy
baghdad burning
wfuv's music blog
kexp's music blog
mimi smartypants
between the miles
just a hippie gypsy
the impossible cool
tomato can brushes
vermont homestead
sugar mountain farm

Good Clean Fun:
gizmodo
futurismic
postsecret
dave barry
human clock
mcsweeney's
spaceweather
book-a-minute
internet archive
self-portrait day
my cat hates you
out of context quotes
surrealist compliment
  generator
strindberg and helium

Makin' Musical Whoopee:
last fm
stereo8
pandora
soma fm

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ABOUT RWS/CONTACT





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