When is a man on holiday but not on holiday?

When is a man on holiday but not on holiday?


Who cares! Pass me another vino tinto! Such is life here in the holiday town at the holiday school with the holiday people. Life is condensed into disposable packages of two or three weeks. Once opened it must be consumed quickly and it is. Relationships form blossom and decay to be replaced by others. Perspectives transform from innocence to experience as the wine bottle is drained giving weeks the feeling of years and fortnights lifetimes. Already I have experienced the passing of old friends and the birth of new ones. I am as an immortal amongst the mayflies – but can immortals keep pace with the doomed?

The first chapter of my Spanish experience is about to come to a close – not such a bad thing for my liver at least. I have spent the last month being fiesta'd (its something that happens to you rather than by you) in a shared flat with other students, socialising with other students and their tourist friends, amongst a sea of tourists from all over the world. By Monday I will be in a new flat, living with locals, two weeks after that all the friends I have so far made (and one I made earlier) will have left and all that now is will no longer be. It's anything but boring.

Before the end of the beginning begins the start of the now. No I haven't been smoking weed (although you can here in the street and in the bars – and yet its not endemic and the sky hasn't fallen in....) but I am looking forward to three weeks off school and to do some exploring with Andrew (who is visiting from Oz). We will see wild places and places that are wild. No doubt there will be picture and so I will share them with you all, also tales, and some of those too will find their way to these pages. But just now I am contemplating tonight's coming adventures and wondering who I will be tomorrow, and with whom....

Running of the cows

I saw the running of the cows last week. Some of you may be familiar with the more famous and, some would say more impressive but what do they know, Running of the Bulls during the San Fermin festival in Pamplona. Well i was not in Pamplona but in Laguardia a tiny pueblo in the foothills of the Pyrenees. I was not there to see the running of the cows but rather to taste some wine because Lagaurdia is wine country (actually most of Spain is wine country which is why its cheaper than water here). Nevertheless, it happened and I saw it.

It may not have been the highlight of my first two weeks indeed I doubt it was anyones highlight of anything but it was a first for me. Let me paint the picture for you. I emerge into the sunlight, along with a bus load of other spanish language students, from the cellar tour of a local winery. The tour had left 90% of the students none the wiser about the niceties of the wine making process of the Basque Country as most of them are beginners and our guide was incapable or simply unwilling to dumb his lifes work down to one clause sentences in the present tense, but it had left them with a raging thirst and so we headed to the local bars.

The first sign that something was UP was the installation of crash barriers along the narrow streets and the local crowd eagerly peering at an empty street. Wine in hand we decided to wait and see what was to happen and before long, much to my bemusement, some of the least impressive heffers i've ever seen scurried up the street to screams of excitement (that the heffers met with streams of excrement). No sign of drunken youths running from their dubious threat nor matadors waiting to dispatch them, in tight pants - just cows and poo. You couldn't help but be enchanted.

I now sit on my balcony waiting to go out and see off the first of my fellow students to leave. Within three weeks almost everyone I have befriended here will have gone home, holidays over leaving me with some happy memories of the first hectic three weeks and a mission to make friends with the none-too-friendly locals...I like a challenge. Ad

Pillow talk

I was going a bit stir crazy last night waiting for my flatmates to arrive (actually one just arrived now as I type this - she seems sane, phew) and so I made this crap video to show you my flat - hmm gotta work on those camera skills..

I blame the pillow too for my inability to get a good nights rest yet and maybe that too has added to the weirdness of the last few days...

I am in a three bedroom flat that is totally occupied by students at the Spanish school I am enrolled at. That means there is a lot of turn over in people and I have already (in six days) met eight students who either were leaving or have just arrived.

Oh dear - my last flatemates have arrived and would you know it - young enough to be my daughters! Oh well they are only two weeks then maybe I'll get someone who can talk about something other than their A-Levels (they're English). The guys who just left were surfers from Holland (shurfers froom de Nederlandsch) they were Schooper cool ya..

Right - anyway San Sebastian. It's right nice. You should all come here - actually you can't cos its full. Its August and the entirety of southern Europe thinks its a great idea to have holidays at the same time, and that time is now. Today being a weekend day by the afternoon it was hard to see the beach for flesh and these Europeans like to show as much flesh are humanly possible (was that a leathery speedo clad man with his mouth open trying to get a tongue tan?).

Full though it may be it still contrives to be lovely - like Goldilocks preferred sleeping arrangements (or was it breakfasting options?) its not too big, not to small, and not too hot and not too cold - I wonder when the bears are coming home?

Here are some photos for your edification... And then I must go and talk to the children....

Left - Old town

Right - not so old big building which I haven't been brave enough to enter lest i be transported to the mother ship and assimilated....