Hola todos! So first, the good news is I have official gotten over jet lag. The eating breakfast at 9:30am/lunch at 2:00pm/dinner at 9:30pm and bed around 2 or 3am (with a much-needed siesta in the afternoon) has become more familiar, and my ability to speak, barter, and get places using only Spanish has much improved. That being said, there are some things that are definitely going to take longer than a few days to get used to! Take for instance, the fashion. MC Hammer pants and bright colored spandex are totally in. Also, the food. I’ve had some form of eggs for dinner three of the last five nights, and can usually identify about one out of every five kinds of meat and seafood served on my plate. Every day is a new fun, but often shocking cultural adventure, so the next few posts will give you a better idea, with some of the pictures, videos and stories that I’ve collected thus far.
In my last post, I mentioned “broken eggs” which I enjoyed for dinner around 11pm other night in Madrid. Expecting to get some form of scrambled eggs, I ordered the house special “Juevos Rotos,” and was surprised to receive a bowl filled with French fries, topped with two sunny side up eggs, grilled chicken strips, raisins, and roasted bell peppers. It was surprisingly tasty – just… odd.
There is lots of other strange food here – “perritos” (hot dogs) are long and very skinny, and usually wrapped inside a croissant. (I'll put pictures up when I have a faster internet connection.) Spanish “bocadillos” or sandwiches are usually some kind of ham (there are so many different kinds that they have a place called Museo de Jamon – or Museum of Ham – offering 20+ different ways to eat it) and melted cheese ON TOP of the sandwich, with some kind of buttery, mayonnaise-y sauce in between. Aside from the Spanish people’s obsession with all things ham, they also LOVE potatoes, and put them in everything. Sandwiches, salad, (I ordered an “enselada” and got a mix of cut up potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, egg, and tuna) and of course they serve them with the “hamburguesa Americana” at McDonalds, where they offer “patatas crispy” on their one euro menu.
The Spanish are proud of their crazy food, and more than anything they love to eat. The biggest meal of the day here is lunch, and it’s served in 3 courses: some kind of paella (rice+seafood or chicken+spices)/pasta with ham of course/calamari/grilled chicken/random Spanish dish, plus bread, and tomato or lentil soup, and salad. Then after all that, for dessert there’s yogurt, flan, pudding, chocolate, fruit, gelato, mazapan, (a Spanish candy made of almond paste that is really addicting) or everyone’s favorite: chocolate con churros. Oh yeah, and the portions are huge, and Senoras take it very personally if you don’t finish everything that’s on your plate. So I have no idea how everyone is Spain is so skinny!!
Speaking of which, the idea of “eating healthy” is laughable to most families. What is important is taste, not nutritional value. My friend Beri and I tried to figure out the calorie to kilocalorie conversion (seems easy enough, right? Kilo = 1,000) …but let’s just say we’ve yet to be very successful. Here’s a video to give you an idea:
So I’ll let you know when I figure it out. In the mean time, by that scale I’m ingesting about 465,850,000 calories a day… so let’s just hope that Delta Airlines has a few extra seatbelt extenders for my trip home.
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