Sorry its been a while between posts, we've been pretty busy, so not too much energy for blogging at night. I never knew the blogosphere could be so demanding.
Saturday was the horse-race/party. We got there at about 4 o'clock, after a couple of the races had occurred. Immediately we were pretty amazed by the party goers. Describing the crew there is immensely difficult, but if I had to, I would say it was eccentric to an almost disconcerting level. Most people were dressed in what looked like their daily farming gear, but with one addition, such as creating a halter top out their work shirt or a huge straw hat. There were tons of white dreadlocks and very few shaved armpits.
There was a pay bar, but everything was really cheap, and there was a good deal of good food. The highlight of the chow was definitely Tara's cakes, especially her carrot cake, which was unbelievable. Las cervezas were 1.30euro a piece, a very nice detail for our evening. For the next couple of hours we hung out with Tara and Stu, talked with some of their friends whom we had already met, and met a few more. The most interesting people I talked to were a couple named Lulu and Boots. Before they moved to Spain they had both worked as "dancers" in Amsterdam. This seemed pretty much par for the course that was this fiesta. A horse named Toro ended up winning the grand finale, after Tara had advised Jack and I to bet on his opponent, Sombra. I hadn't bet, but Jack put 5euro on Sombra, a loss that Tara felt much worse about than Jack.
At that point it had started to get dark, so the real party began. First, there was a flamenco performance, which was really good. Tara has seen the dancer several times, apparently she performs in big venues quite often. Then there was a jazz trio that kinda sucked; it wouldn't have been so bad, except that they took forever to set up, during which time people lost interest in partying and queued up for the chili being served. They came off the stage at about 10, at which time, Jack and Tara went home. I was pretty pumped to keep going as long as the night would take me, no matter that Jack had to go home and watch episodes of Sex and the City on his computer. Whatever.
After the live music, several DJ's took over, including our very own Stu, who goes by the name of Chopstuey when he's spinning the tunes. They played all electronic music, which was kind of surprising to me. When I think of earthy farmers up in the mountains, I don't normally think of pulsing electronic club music, but it was certainly a lot of fun. I did a bit of dancing, which was solid because I could make as much of a fool of myself as possible, with no real consequences. Unless Mattias, who was filming some bits of the party, wishes to put anything on Facebook. Hopefully his internet is too slow to perform that function.
The highlight of the party was undoubtedly the performance by Stu's roommate, a gap-toothed Brit named Ray, who is a really cool guy. He, in accordance with a promise he made to his buddies one night at the pub, dressed up in drag, in a pink dress leant to him by Tara. He had a wig and makeup, it was purely fantastic. He sang "I Will Survive", but modified the lyrics, so that it told the story of a woman leaving her man because of discontent with what I'll call the size of his endowment. Unreal.
Other than dancing, I talked with some of Stu's buddies, mostly with a couple of gents named Howard and Jamie. Jamie was a dead ringer for John C. Reilly, and probably a little funnier. My night ended at around 4 am, when I found a tree to sleep under in the sleeping bag I borrowed from Tara. It was a great time, and one that I paid for the next day.
Since then, we've been working hard, doing almonds as well as some painting and gardening. Today, Treacy emailed Jack about the bizarre terror alert the Obama administration sent out regarding tourists in Europe. We haven't been able to find much on it, as surfing the web takes a lot time, but as far as I can tell it doesn't really say anything. It just warns to be vigilant and take precaution, whatever the hell that means. I suppose whereas before the warning, I may have considered accepting a parcel in the airport from a stranger, now I almost certainly won't. What's more, the administration didn't give any reason for why it was delivering the warning. So much for a culture of transparency, although it sounded great during the campaign.
Hope everybody is well, stay fly
much love luke
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