Caotica Ana

Caótica Ana is a 2007 drama film by Spanish director Julio Médem.

The movie began with Ana selling paintings at an artesan market on the island Ibiza, Spain. She lives with her father in a cave dwelling made into a home, in an ocean paradise. A woman from Madrid invites Ana to attend an art academy in Madrid, where she would live in a co-op with other young artists from around the world. Ana daydreams about her past lives. Through hypnosis, Ana proves that she does not live alone, that her existence seems like a continuation of other lives of young women who live in the abyss of her unconscious memory. This is her chaos. The film was  filled with visual art.

Link to watch online:

http://www.megavideo.com/?v=ORDEXDCQ

Elevated

Two very strange elevator experiences took place for me this evening, en seguidas…

On Wednesdays, I finish giving an English class to two little boys around 7.30 pm. Their apartment is right across the corner from mine. Yoga is at 8, and I stop quickly by my place to put down my things and change.

Arriving in my apartment building, I see a man enter the right elevator. I noticed that he saw me enter the building, but instead of waiting, went up in the elevator, which is a little strange because usually people wait and ask if you are coming up as well. The last few days the left elevator was out of service, but today the sign was gone, So I pushed the button, and it came down. I begin to go up the elevator and it stops. The inner door opens, like I have arrived at my floor, but I see a brick wall and below the top half of a door. But, the door will not open between floors. I push all the buttons and nothing happens. I push the emergency button, and through the speakers comes a voice of a lady from the elevator company. “Estas atrapada? Are you trapped?” We were talking for a few seconds, but then I think she put me on hold. I was starting to get a little nervous.. because I wanted to make it to yoga! I was sending a text to my roommate “Estoy atrapada dento del asensor!” as I heard people talking outside the door. Weirdly I did not say anything, but then I heard “alguien adentro?” Is someone inside? I said yes, and then the outer door opened and the portero was below. I could their heads down near where my feet where, and had to hop down between the wall above me to the floor.  We were on the 5th floor and I joined a man, his son and stoller on their way up in the right elevator.

After quickly changing, I got into the right elevator to go back down. It started going down, but stopped very shortly after at the 7th floor and a man got in. I was facing towards the door, with a mirror behind. So the man was staring at the mirror upon walking into the elevator. I said “hola” and instead of even looking at me, he was staring in the mirror, messing a little with his face and hair, then turned back around to face the door. I was staring at him the whole time and he was staring forward. When we got to the bottom, he opened the elevator door and lobby door without even looking back or holding the door open. I pass him before we reach the outside fence, therefore I open the gate and hold it open for him to be able to catch it. But, as I am looking back, he totally turns his head backwards. I was just thinking, how akward is this guy or very afraid!

 

Abarán

At 12 o’ clock my roomate Alison and I took off from the bus station of Murcia to the town of Abaran, which is about 45 minutes outside of Murcia.

Maria Jesus, my coworker, had invited me to come have lunch at her home to try her specialty, paella de mariscos.

Maria Jesus and her husband Jose have lived in Abaran all of their lives. They have known each other since they were 15 and started dating at 19. Now they are married and have a four year old daughter, Daida. One of the photos above is of the church where they got married at.

Right now they are living in apartment, waiting for the construction their casa de campo to be completed. We drove up to the sight where their house is being constructed, which is on the property of Jose’s parents ranch house, which they only live at during the summers. We were going to the ranch house to have our “comida”. We walked past Jose’s uncle’s house, which is on the same property. Him and his wife were outside collecting olives, which they would later bring to the factory which would press the olives into oil for them. I tried to eat an olive off of a tree one time in Cieza, and realized this should not be done. So bitter! Like the rosewater that I took a drink of today, which I bought from a market after getting off of the bus. Needless to say, it wasn’t meant for drinking.  😛 And, olives are not good to eat until they are put in water and salt or whatever it is..

Before lunch, we took a tour of the property and of the house which was being constructed. There was a gorgeous 360 degree view of the town and the valleys. All of the properties were covered with fruit trees, mostly olives, Mandarins, oranges, lemons, pomegranates and figs, peaches and apricots too but these only have fruit in the summer.  The families eat from their own gardens and have people come collect the fruit for exportation as well.

Maria Jesus served us excellent seafood paella, which is a traditional Spanish dish from this region. It is rice cooked in a stir fry pan, with saffron, tomato sauce, big shrimps, little shrimps, clams, scallops, mussels and vegetables. I loved it, but I always feel a little repentant about the seafood, especially  when I see the whole shrimps with their little faces. I really enjoy eating seafood now, but am not sure that its ok to eat these little critters. On the other hand, there was also a delicious salad with goat cheese and walnuts. Poor Alison, she does not like seafood and is allergic to nuts.

After lunch we walked through the garden and filled up two bags with mandarins, pomegranates, figs and lemons, then drove 5 mins back to the town where theirapartment is. We walked through the park next to the river, passing a historic but still functioning irrigation mill, and then to drink a cafe.

Before driving us back to Murcia, we went up to the apartment of Maria Jesus and Jose, saw their two tiny kittens, and left Daida with her grandmother, who lives right next door.

Que dia tan bonita!!!

Not a dream

I have been having a hard time finding a good park here in Murcia. They are usually cemented plazas with a playground and benches, and little patches of grass not so good for sitting on.

Until today. Today, I decided to go find a sunny place to read or draw or lo que sea. I walked passed many little parks until finally I see a bridge crossing over the river. There are green trees ahead after crossing the bridge. It turns out to be a square filled with HUGE trees with enormous roots. so, I went and sat between the roots (I could not believe how massive they were). The sun was strong but there was lots of shade from the trees, so the shade and the sun were all scattered between the leaves. There was a light breeze and all these little orange and green pods were slowly drizzling by. Then, an enormous grasshopper sat right across from me. He was tan and about 4 inches long. He had gray eyes and we were staring at each other for about 5 minutes, until I decided to stretch out my crossed legs, which got too close too fast so he flew away!

I was walking around with a new spanish friend, Maribel, yesterday and she mentioned a good park and what direction it was in (So I was kind of headed that way to see if I got lucky by finding it). She mentioned the big roots so I definitely knew this was the one she was talking about. I got her email address this day and it was MGaladriel. I asked her if her last name was Galidriel and she said that that was the name of the forest elf from Lord of the Rings.

After the park, and after reading for a couple hours in a cafe, I met with someone outside the cathedral who was interested in private classes. We went to another cafe, which turned out being called El Duende del Parque, the menu had little dwarves on it. They served hot chocolates, coffees, teas, and spirits, but they have especially good hot chocolate and teas. I got poppy tea, and it was just the dried flowers/leaves. The tea was dark purple! I just looked up poppy tea on Wikipedia and it had lots of interesting things to say about that. There was a string of colorful merkaba lights across the bar. Hot Chip was playing.

I have been tracking my dreams for the past couple of weeks. They have become very vivid due to the mugwort under my pillow. They all occur in the mountains / forest areas and I have been meeting with many friends and family members in these dreams. This goes to show how we make our dreams become reality..

Thom York

“And It Rained All Night”

And it rained all night and washed the filth away
Down New York airconditioned drains
The click click clack of the heavy black trains
A million engines in neutral

The tick tock tick of a ticking timebomb
Fifty feet of concrete underground
One little leak becomes a lake
Says the tiny voice in my earpiece
So I give in to the rhythm
The click click clack
I’m too wasted to fight back
Tick tack goes the pendulum on the old grandfather clock

I can see you
But I can never reach you

And it rained all night and then all day
The drops were the size of your hands and face
The worms come out to see what’s up
We pull the cars up from the river

It’s relentless
Invisible
Indefatigable
Indisputable
Undeniable

So how come it looks so beautiful?
How come the moon falls from the sky?

I can see you
But I can never reach you

I can see you
But I can never reach you

 

We are the World

Our bodies are small copies of the earth we stand upon and our spirits small copies of the universal Life-Force.

We have layers of skin like the earth’s crust.

Feathers and hairs that grow like the grass and the trees upon the earth.

Veins and vessels beneath our skin that act like the rivers and streams that run beneath the earth.

Flesh like soil and bone like rock.

A great percentage of the earth is water and liquid just like our body.

Beneath the earth is a substance called lava, which is hot and red like our blood.

Now and then the earth splits open and spills out lava just like our body does.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCoIPT9aMlE

Eat, Pray, Love

I have been hearing a lot about this book lately and was interested in reading it. Today I was searching for a movie to watch in Spanish and this one came up. I didn’t know it was a movie also. So, if you are interested in this book or just interested in watching a movie in Spanish, here is the link. As for me, I still haven’t watched the whole thing yet.

Wikipedia: Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia is a 2006 memoir byAmerican author Elizabeth Gilbert. The memoir chronicles the author’s trip around the world after her divorce and what she discovered during her travels. The book remained on the New York Times Best Seller list for 187 weeks.

 

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo

Strange Fruit

Southern trees bear strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.

The first fruit is cherimoya, I saw it in Vietnam but never tried it. Well, they  have it in Spain too and its tasty! Wikipedia tells me that MArk Twain called it “the most deliscious fruit known to men”. It reminds me of a mixture between a pear and a durian, because you have to eat the slimy fruit of off a bunch of little seeds, but the texture and taste is kind of similar to a pear.

The second one is a picture of yellow dates. I always wondered if dates where possible to eat fresh ( I have only seen the dried version). So, I found these fresh dates here. I tried one of them really ripe (it had turned brown) and it was really sweet. You can eat them when they are yellow but they are crunchy and not as delicious. I bought a branch of yellow ones and am waiting for them to get ripe; it has been about a week and still no progress..

The last two images are of  higo chumbo or prickly pear. Higo means fig in spanish. I have never tried one before, but after researching I realized it is called “Tuna” and I tried this flavor of ice cream in Cafayate, Argentina. Baloo says in Jungle Book: “Don’t pick the prickly pear by the paw”. My friend who introduced it to me thinks it is the “Mejor fruta del planeta”. It was delicious but I still think regular figs are even better!

White

Hola Murcia!

1. I just moved to Murcia, Spain to work as an  Auxiliar de Conversación or Language and Culture Assistant, non-Spanish nationals of US, English, French, etc… nationality, who go to a region of Spain to teach his or her native language at a primary, secondary, or official language school for eight months as part of a program run by the Spanish Ministry of Education.

2-3. The second two photos are of the city of Cieza, the city where my school is located. Cieza’s economy is based mainly on thecultivation of peaches and olives, and is a dig site where many ancient ceramics and other artifacts have been found.

4. The last picture is of Campoamor. I visited the beach with my roommate because his family has a vacation house there. He went there to walk his dogs and I hung out at the beach.

Here is a google maps link to a close up view of my apartment building, located in Plaza Juan XXIII: