The end is near...

My holiday is nearly coming to an end. Can’t believe I will be in Sigowet on Monday, in only 4 days! So here is a summary of the last weeks.

To celebrate Pablo’s birthday (once again) we invited his workmates for some beers on the roof terrace. Who has ever celebrated their birthday first on a roof terrace in Bergen then some days after on a roof terrace in Sevilla?!! 20 young engineers on the terrace made it almost like a student party. There was even a guitar-playing engineer among them (or better: an engineer-working guitarist because he was incredibly professional). Imagine a warm evening in Sevilla, with cold beer, nice people, an illuminated Giralda (tower of the cathedral) in the background and live flamenco music! Pablo had told me (with stars in his eyes) about a super-table with four stools that you can convert into a suitcase. Apparently he had also told his colleagues about it because they brought him one for his birthday! Great for dinners on the roof and lunch in the park!

We’ve also been to Malaga to see Yvonne that came all the way from Switzerland for 24 hours! Good to see that she is still the good old crazy Yvi! We stayed in the wonderful house of the family Sax and did the things you need to do in that place: swim in cold water, eat Birger müsli, drink fresh orange juice, sing along to Kiss FM, laugh in the sofa bed in the living-room, do the ‘airplane’ and drink vino tinto!

We’ve had a picnick in the Maria-Lucia park (didn´t bring the super-table this time), enjoyed a lot of nice tapas and beer, been to the cinema, had dinner on the roof terrace and Pablo has of course been working a lot and I have struggeled with a chapter of my master thesis. So it hasn’t all been a time off.

We explored the coast of Huelva on Saturday. According to the map there was a long shore of sandy beach just nearby Huelva, so we went to look for it. They had built a wooden path all the way from the parking spot to the beach through the sandy hills of pine trees. There were no shops, no cafés, no sellers, no great offers, no special prices, only people having picknicks and sunbathing. What a great place!

May 1st we went to see Nani and Virginia in Cordoba. We had a stroll around the outside of the mosque (that the christians converted to a cathedral) and around a brand new amusement park for children that would be just as amusing for adults!

Feria de Sevilla!

The Feria in Sevilla is an explosion of colours and light, it’s folklore and traditions and it’s very much fun! The traditional andalucian dresses changes ery year. One year the dresses may have long sleves, another year only straps. The pattern may be black dots on red bckground or pink flowers on yellow and mint basis. It is not like the Norwegian traditional dress bunad, where there are strickt rules on coloures, fabric and pattern. When Camilla made her vest green instead of red, people would make remarks and ask if it was done according to the ‘tradition’. (Hope I got that right Camilla!) Well the tradition of the Flamenco dress is apparently much more open for creativity. Maybe that’s why so many girls and women wear it?!

The Feria is situated outside the city center of Sevilla and it lasts for one week. The whole area is made up of smaller or bigger ‘casetas’, that are tents or houses that you can enter if you know someone inside or if you have a ticket. Pablo have convinced me that the Feria in Jerez is even better than the one in Sevilla because eveyone is allowed to enter in any caseta, there are no restrictions.

Inside the casetas you talk, drink (the typical drink of the Feria is the Rebujito, a mix of Manzanilla/sherry and 7up with a lot of ice), dance, sing and eat tapas. It looked as if almost all the people knew how to dance Sevillana. Some even playes the castanets. I didn’t dare to get on to the dancing floor, think I would need some more outsiders with me to have the courage! I left Pablo to dance with the sevillian girls.

The Feria goes on the whole day and night. The caseta becomes your home and your home is your bedroom, according to the people here. I thought flamenco dresses, fans, castanets, sevillanas and horse parades were more spectacles for the postcards that a real living tradition. I was certainly wrong.