Happy New Year

Happy 2008 everyone!

(even though my everyone probably only includes an audience of 3 people, my mom and my fiancé being two...woah, I have a fiancé!)

The holidays are officially over and I am feeling an overwhelming sense of “wait a second, it already happened??” I, being typical me, completely overbooked myself for the 2+ weeks of vacation that I had. One week back in the States, that seemed more like a quick weekend, gave me less than sufficient time to do most of the things on my to-do and to-see list. Sorry to everyone who I unwillingly shafted. It was nice to spend some quality, albeit minimal, time with my family. I miss them a lot this year, especially my Owen who is changing drastically on what seems like daily basis.

Owen and Jack on their new John Deere.

After the whirlwind visit at home it was back to Spain for New Year’s Eve and to experience some of the holiday traditions here. Due to our plans to travel to Andorra the following day, New Year’s consisted of a nice family diner at Paco’s aunt and uncle’s home and then home to bed. As you know dinner here is eaten quite late (10ish) and New Years was no different. Lots of seafood and of course some ham and chorizo later I was stuffed. But in Spain, you have to save room for at least 12 grapes. The tradition here is to eat the 12 grapes with each of the bell chimes once the clock strikes midnight. If you don’t you are destined to a year of bad luck. Well, you can imagine what happened to me. Let’s just say I needed a few more chimes. However, I can't be bothered with such superstition because that same night I carried away the gordo (the big prize) in the Castro family bingo pool….that’s right 5 euritos!

In the picture you can see the famous “cagonet” which is apparently a staple in the Spanish Nativity scene. In Spain the most central Christmas decoration, even more so than the Christmas tree, is the Nativity scene (here it’s call El Belén, or the Bethlehem) Paco’s Aunt had one that was quite large, and of course I couldn’t resist photographing the strangest thing I see.

January 1 it was off to Andorra for a week of skiing (and again as luck would have it I did not break any limbs!) Andorra is a tiny country in the Pyrenees Mountains between Spain and France. (This ain't no Montage mountan, folks.)One might even mistake it as part of Spain, but it is its own country which lives almost entirely off the winter sports business. It is quite a quaint mountain country and the constant smell of firewood adds to the cozy ambiance. We had good weather and a good time, but man, was I exhausted.

We stayed in Andorra until the Three Kings Day (January 6) which here in Spain is the end of the Christmas holiday and the day of the presents. I was lucky enough to see my first Cabalgata (3 Kings parade) in Andorra. It began at the top of a slope right by our apartment and it began with fireworks and a snake of lights creeping down the slope. It turns out the snake was about 40 ski patrollers with torches who were leading the three Kings, each of which arrived on his own snow grooming machine. I have to admit, Santa doesn’t do anything that cool.

I was also lucky enough to win at Playstation buzz to be the queen for the day, so naturally I wore my crown and cut the Roscon de Reyes (a cream filled pastry-like cake that is eaten on 3 Kings day in Spain.) And furthermore, I didn’t get the figurine in my piece (which means I didn’t have to pay for the cake!)

2008 looks like it might be an ok year