Día de la Comunidad Valenciana (October 9th)

It's time to play a little catch-up and do some posts about Fall Break (October 8th - 17th).... better late than never, right?

The first weekend of fall break I stayed in Valencia because October 9th is el Día de la Comunidad Valenciana, one of Valencia's biggest holidays besides las Fallas in the spring.  In a nut shell, this holiday commemorates the arrival of King Jaime I to Valencia in 1238.  The day is filled with traditional Valencian festivities which I realized are actually difficult to attend.  You either miss them because Spanairds have no sense of time and always begin/end events early/late, or if your lucky you just stumble upon random events that weren't on the schedule.  The holiday kicks off at midnight with a HUMONGOUS fireworks show.  Although I love the fireworks at Crystal during New Year's, I don't think I'll ever be impressed by them again.  Valencia fireworks simply can't be beaten.  Even the one's at Disneyland weren't as good, and that's really saying something.  These fireworks were epic, to say the least, and Emily and I randomly stumbled up them on our walk home.  We really didn't have a choice whether or not we wanted to watch them because they were set off in the Río (the giant park that bisects the city) and the police weren't allowing anyone to cross the Río, which is the only way we could get home.  Only in Spain do fireworks start at midnight, last til 1:30am, and involve eardrum-damaging amounts of noise.

We let our ears recover overnight, and the next morning went to the Procesión de la Señera, or the parade of the original flag of Valencia, La Señera.  The parade included a lot of Valencian government officials and people dressed in traditional clothes of las fallas.

We tried to go to a Fallas dance performance, but off course missed it due to false advertising and instead got stuck in a freak rain storm.  The streets flooded within minutes and Emily and I, desperately trying to get on any bus who's route seemed vaguely familiar, got on one that took us completely out of Valencia.  We were keeping track of where we were on our Valencia maps that we carry with us everywhere, and at one point we actually disappeared off the map.  It was quite the adventure and I now avoid using the buses as much as possible :p

El Día de la Comunidad Valenciana also coincides with the festival of Saint Denis, aka Spain's version of Sweetest Day.  It's tradition for boyfriends/husbands to give their girlfriends/wives tiny marzipan fruits wrapped in a scarf.  I went to Mercado Colon that day and got to see pastry chefs making the marzipan works of art, and even got to try one myself.  I felt bad eating them because they were so pretty!

One month later...

I have completely failed to keep this blog updated as much as I was hoping too.  Guess that's just further proof that classes really do exist during study abroad.  I'm planning on doing posts about my fall break trip, and hopefully will find the time to complete them soon.  But I need a break from homework right now and today was a pretty amusing day...

I started the day off as a tourist, visiting the popular sites in Valencia that I've been meaning to see.  First, el Mercado Central, a giant food market.  I was amazed and disgusted all at the same time by the variety of things you can purchase.  The seafood area was especially ridiculous.  Who knew you could eat a sting ray?

Inside Mercado Central

Valencian oranges...the best I've ever had.

When you buy a chicken, you literally get the whole chicken.

Sting ray for dinner?

How about eels?

Dried out hunks of ham

Me in front of Mercado Central

Next on the tour was La Lonja, a gothic style commercial market building built between 1482 and 1548.  It's full name is La Lonja de la Seda (The Silk Exchange) and was used as a place for commercial business in Valencia during the 16th century.  The columns in the main hall are amazing, and there's a garden of orange trees in the center of the building.

The Trading Hall of La Lonja

Since the weather was so nice today (70 degrees in November?!), we wandered around Valencia for the rest of the morning, stumbling upon more typical tourist sites like the Torres de Quart.  The historical center of Valencia was once surrounded by the city walls, but now all that remains of the wall are the Torres de Quart and the Torres de Serrano, which were the original entrances to the city.  We climbed up a bajillion steps to get to the top of the Torres de Quart and were rewarded with an amazing view of Valencia. 

Wooden doors on the way up to the top of the Torres de Quart

View of Valencia from the top

The emblem of Valencia is everywhere!

On our way home, we walked through Plaza de la Reina and I stopped for a bit to listen to a trio of students who were performing around the corner from the plaza.  They were sooooo talented and you could tell that they really enjoyed performing.

 

The nightmare seafood at Mercado Central came back to haunt me at lunch today... Adela prepared shrimp, which I love, but these shrimp were straight from the sea.  Head, eyeball, antennae, legs, everything.  At first I was thinking "No big deal, I'll just cut off the head, because you obviously wouldn't eat that, and then it'll just be a normal American style shrimp!" Wrong.... Adela showed me how to cut off the head, and then she proceeded suck all the guts out of the head part!  Ughhhhh I thought I was going to vomit.  Luckily, she offered to cut off all the heads and let me eat the bodies while she sucked all the brains out of the head as if they were the most delicious thing she'd ever eaten. 

I've come to realize that meal times with Adela are often the most fun part of my day.  We watch the news during lunch and dinner, and the other day there was a story about a women who was murdered in her apartment 16 years ago, but police never discovered who the killer was until just now.  Adela was explaining this all to me, but because she talks so quickly, when I relayed the story back to her I was under the impression that this women had been dead in her apartment for 16 years and police had just discovered her rotting body.  Needless to say, Adela just about choked on her food and we both had to use our napkins as kleenex because we were laughing so hard :p

Today at dinner I walk into the kitchen to find Galgo curled up in Lexi's bed!  He was curled up in the tiniest little ball in order to fit on it, and Lexi was completely distraught with the idea of having no where to sit.  Adela has decided to buy Galgo a new bed with little sides on it like Lexi's in the hope that he will no longer feel the need to steal her bed haha.

 

Just like Mom and Dad, Adela tends to mix up my name with the dogs' names, frequently saying "¡Chelsea, en tu sitio!" (Chelsea, go to your spot!) when trying to get Lexi to stop begging for food from us during meals.  During lunch today when this happened I just looked at Adela and and said "But I am in my spot!"  Completely embarrassed by her mistake, we both just about died of laughter and Laura, her daughter, simply looked at us like we were crazy haha.  We probably are :p

¡Hasta luego!