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Slow Risers
Perhaps I worry too much about getting up early, especially on vacation, but my travel partners have the hardest time getting up, even for a 10am breakfast. I was half done eating before they made it out to the table for our second morning at Posada. Then after finishing, it was not long before they were dozing off on the couch in the lounge. After a while, Conchi came over to talk.
Life in Spain
I don't remember how it got started, but we talked for almost two hours. Conchi, the woman of the pension, told me how she and her husband are originally from Bilbao to the east, but Antonio has had a bookstore in Santander for some time now. They lived in that city until only two months ago when they came out to their weekend home to live for good. Antonio still drives into town every day for work, and he makes it back for lunch and a siesta in the afternoon. Midori and Yai had taken a liking to this Antonio, so we decided to wait for his return at 2pm.
One thing that we were curious about is the reason for the crowded cities in Spain. From what we have seen, it looks like about ninety percent of the people live in apartments stacked up in the cities and
smaller towns. There are very few individual houses even in villages. Conchi explained that although there is lots of open space in the country, until recently, the country was a place for poor people. The schools were all in the cities and the transportation to and from was not good. Today it seems to me like the high-speed roads and other highway are quite sufficient, but the people still live in the cramped cities. There must be some other reason...
People
She explained a bit about how the people differ by region. I had already learned some about the different languages that spawn the different nationalist type movements in some regions. Conchi explained how the people in the south are more social. They spend more time outside sharing their lives with their friends. Very talkative. Many travelers find the south to be more tourist friendly even though it is very hot.
Somehow we got into a talk about religion too. If I had to guess, I would have thought that Spain was still a very Catholic country. The tourist scene is dominated by many beautiful cathedrals and Catholic is still almost the only religion. Furthermore, I found Mexico to be very Catholic (in faith, if not in action) if that means anything. However, Conchi feels that most young people don't seem to care much anymore. This seems to be true of most of the world, for better or worse.
Antonio
After more random conversation, Antonio came home. It wasn't long before he started telling us everything about anything in his own brand of Spanish with English thrown in here and there. He taught me the word for a bicyclist who likes to roll over the plains, and how he is different from the climber or the sprinter. He talked about the book business, esperanto, universities, and the sixties in Spain. I like this guy's style.
Madrid
But we had to move on. Yai is supposed to fly from Madrid to the States tomorrow. We gave them a warm goodbye and promised to send our friends their way. After a few hours on the road, we made it back to the capital. To tired to look for accommodation, we crashed at McDonald's for a bit. When we did look for a place, we had little luck. A hostel downtown would not have parking, and a hotel in the suburbs would be to expensive. One place told us that their regular prices were the group rate, so we got the foreigner price.???
Double Room
Finally we just drove out to the country a bit and found a cheaper place along the road. We got a double room which seemed cheap enough, but as the three of us walked in we got stopped. As we were told before, three people can't sleep in two beds. I would think that that is our problem, but the hotel seems very concerned about this. Before we were told it was something about security. I think it is some law. Must be a holdover from fascism. Anyway, twas a good day overall.
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