Day Trip around Navarra

Sorry for the delay in posting, and sorry to those who were worried that I had uncharacteristically dropped off for so many days. These few days have been super hectic as well!

Photo Splurge Part 1
On Saturday day, my Uni organised a day trip around the province of Navarra, it was great: we visited small villages/towns close to the border with France, and saw heaps of the natural landscape. I took a lot of photos, and I wanted to post heaps of them up, so it has taken some time.

We went down into this misty valley

This was around 10am in the morning, but the mist made everything look like ghost town

Some of the Australian girls =)

Cute little buildings

I love this shot: the mist is still clinging to this little town

funny trees too

Entrance to Zugarramurdi Caves

Beautiful mountain scenery =)

Small villages are scattered in between these mountains and plains

A little farm with a pig and cow

A few hundred metres outside the caves

Dance Night

Ran errands today for the visa, thinking I wouldn't be able to make it home to skype my boyfriend. But thank God that there was Wi-fi in the lobby outside the waiting room for the errand. And thank you to my brother Ben for buying me an Ipod touch 4G for skyping anywhere with Wi-Fi =D

Interestingly enough, I met an Egyptian ballet/belly dance teacher in the cafe with the amazing hot chocolate. Maybe I'll take some classes... I was thinking about an online sermon about mission, and it raised a really interesting point that mission is a lifestyle here and now.

Lunch

At night, I met up with a Spanish teacher I met on jazz night (and her Spanish and Italian friends) to head out to Noazin (a little town around Pamplona) to watch a contemporary dance show.

Culture Centre in Noazin

A small intimate hall!

Amazing music
Mikel Gaztelurrutia Trio: with jazz music and improvisation =)
It was really really nice

The contemporary dance group TempoMobil
It was really good, especially the partnered dance sessions! 

Quick Dinner

I've just been reading Psalm 51, it's an amazing prayer. It's by the greatest king of Israel - King David - who had followed God closely his whole life until he committed adultery with the married woman Bathsheba and killed her husband to marry her.

For the director of music. A psalm of David. When the prophet Nathan came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba.

 ¹ Have mercy on me, O God,
   according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
   blot out my transgressions.
² Wash away all my iniquity
   and cleanse me from my sin.


 ³ For I know my transgressions,
   and my sin is always before me.
⁴ Against you, you only, have I sinned
   and done what is evil in your sight;
so you are right in your verdict
   and justified when you judge.
⁵ Surely I was sinful at birth,
   sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
⁶ Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb;
   you taught me wisdom in that secret place.


 ⁷ Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
   wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
⁸ Let me hear joy and gladness;
   let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
⁹ Hide your face from my sins
   and blot out all my iniquity.


 ¹⁰ Create in me a pure heart, O God,
   and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
¹¹ Do not cast me from your presence
   or take your Holy Spirit from me.
¹² Restore to me the joy of your salvation
   and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.


 ¹³ Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
   so that sinners will turn back to you.
¹⁴ Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God,
   you who are God my Savior,
   and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
¹⁵ Open my lips, Lord,
   and my mouth will declare your praise.
¹⁶ You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
   you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
¹⁷ My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit;
   a broken and contrite heart
   you, God, will not despise.


 ¹⁸ May it please you to prosper Zion,
   to build up the walls of Jerusalem.
¹⁹ Then you will delight in the sacrifices of the righteous,
   in burnt offerings offered whole;
   then bulls will be offered on your altar.

El Dia de San Blas

Today was the day of Saint Blas (El Día de San Blas) which I had never heard of until my flat mate told me the night before. It's apparently only celebrated in Pamplona. It's not an actual festival, just a small celebration.

The following picture is was about 10am in the morning, with a parade for Saint Blas, in the old district of town outside the church of Saint Nicholas I think. Apparently he has holy healing powers for the throat, though stomach aches from all the sugary donuts seem more likely. I had no idea this was happening, until I saw the stalls in the afternoon at around 6pm =( Once again I miss out

Apologies for the poor quality of the pictures, my camera's battery died and I had to use my ipod touch, which only takes bad quality pictures. 

Courtesy of noticiasdenavarra.com
The link goes to the story (in Spanish)
http://noticiasdenavarra.com/2011/02/03/vecinos/pamplona/los-pamploneses-renuevan-su-tradicion-con-los-roscos-bendecidos-por-san-blas

There is a mini zoo in the Taconera Park:
There's a peacock, chooks, ducks...
El Parque de Taconera

Just some really cute pisos in the Old District

The Iruña Cafe where Hemmingway once had coffee
It's in the main plaza in the centre of the city Plaza del Castillo

Dia de San Blas
As part of the celebrations: street stalls sell sweet cakes and lollies

There were heaps of people and children!
And of course sugar all around

I'm finding the whole concept of Festivals in the names of Saints very pagan and superstitious! Todays festival has something to do with getting food blessed by the saint to gain healing properties for the throat. When I get 2 cartons of milk, another 2 cartons of drinks and bread for under 3€ at a chain supermarket, a small doughy cake at the stalls cost over 7€ - apparently because they had been "blessed" by this saint. 

The infamous Running of the Bulls is also referred to as San Fermin,  remembering (or celebrating?) the martyrdom of a Christian by being tied by his feet to a bull and being dragged to his death. (according to Spero News http://www.speroforum.com/site/article.asp?id=13035)


Martyred Christians died because it was better to die knowing and proclaiming Christ, than it was to deny Him and live without Him. It's ironic and a bit sad that their martyrdom, which should have underlined the preciousness of the gospel of Christ; has now replaced the gospel altogether.
Pamplona seems like a Catholic city with its many imposing cathedrals, its festivals of Saints and a religious private university; but their approach to God seems more like one's approach to superstition and tradition. 

It's not clear here: I wanted to take a discreet shot
The woman in white on the right has taken out five dogs for a walk
I seem to see a lot of different types of dogs here.

Dinner with a baguette on the side of course
It looks worse than it is! I could only get red onion, and the egg has red stains,
plus I put in soy sauce,which made it look brown.... but really it's yummy

I had an interesting chat with my flat mate over dinner tonight. I asked him a burning question of mine: 

Why do all the old ladies (ancianas) wear fur coats, dresses and stockings in 3°C weather? 

The stockings are practically bare skin in the cold - being at least 40 years younger than them, I can't even feel my bare fingertips after a few minutes never mind bare legs! He does not personally know these ancianas but he explains that they were the generation that grew up under Franco's dictatorship with rigid ideas of what is proper - that women wear dresses, and men wear pants. 

What do they think of girls wearing jeans?

Nothing good.  

It's weird to think that something I consider history still has such a pervasive grasp on people's social consciousness. But when you think about it, Franco's dictatorship only ended with his death in 1975, so people born in the 1960s would have grown up under his education system, making them the generation over 50 today. 

I've noticed that no one under the age of 50 wears a fur coat, while almost uniformly, those over 50 do. Is this an indication of the drastic changes in Spanish society since Franco?

Jazz Night

After a boring day on Tuesday, I heard about a jazz bar with live music at night. It was in a basement bar at the city centre at the Plaza del Castillo. I was not expecting to hear jazz music in Spain! I really enjoyed it - something social outside of clubbing and heavy drinking =)

Jazz Band!
My flat mate was really excited to hear I saw the band,
apparently they study music together

Photos courtesy of facebook

The toilets were really funky: everything was frosted glass and dim lighting

Just some nice pictures of the following day. It was very nice and sunny, but incredibly windy and very cold. 

Lunch Time!

Little Miss Boring

Stayed at home for most of the day doing nothing.
Yesterday was hectic, trying to do student visa extension - the office was completely full - people were waiting outside in the cold. About 50 people serviced by 4-5 booths. I got there, made a booking, came back an hour and half later, waited half an hour; and got rejected in 5 minutes because I didn't have the paperwork that wasn't mentioned on the website =_=" Met a funny construction worker just a street outside. It was really awkward, because I passed there at least 4 times in 2 hours T_T
Anyhow, that was where I found the awesome hot chocolate (look at picture from last post!), and had Conejo al ajillo (Rabbit in Garlic and Olive Oil Sauce) and it really really did taste like chicken. Today I saw some rabbit fur gloves, I really wanted them! Here they have a love affair with fur - all the old ladies over 60 have luxurious fur trench coats. No one under 60 had them though.

One interesting thing was that I found a Lindt Chocolate bar with 99% Cacao today, the maximum I've seen in Sydney is 85%, so I can't wait to try ^^

Not much to show for today: just what I made for lunch and dinner. It may seem stupid, but after getting over the initial "what-do-I-make" panic, I'm pretty excited to cook for myself.

Lunch: Salad with freshly bought bread

Dinner: Cheese Omelette
with Chorizo, Tomato, Cucumber, Rice Wine
Funny combo but tasted nice

More Food =)

Loving the shopping here!
I discovered a store called Hakei: they have these amazing soft leather boots and bags
This pair of full leather boots was 80€ - you'd get synthetic boots for that price back home!
But they didn't have my size =(

They have these cute things at crossings:
I call it a dog, my friend prefers calling it a carnivorous dinosaur
But dogs have sharp teeth too, right?

Just a residential street in Pamplona Calle Abejeras

 I take back what I said about having an amazing hot chocolate the other day. I found an even better hot chocolate which is literally melted dark chocolate at only 2.10€ mmmmm 

Menu del Dia: Risotto y Frutos del Mar

My Rabbit!
I seriously think it tastes like chicken

Church in Pamplona, 2nd time round

I just went to church again, and a third of the way through the service, I'm wondering what I'm doing.

The point where I wanted to run, was right after the singing. The pastor walked around the room, and put his hand on the forehead of those who were praying (especially those who were crying) and shouted again and again ¡Ahora! (Now!) until the person cried even more and collapsed onto their seat/ground.
When he made his way back on stage to pray, prayer consisted of music in the background, people praying out loud all around, and the pastor saying things like Ahora es tu tiempo Dios, (It is your time now Lord) Si Si Dios, (Yes Yes Lord). I think prayer should just be talking intelligibly to God. But all the noise made it really difficult for me to pray - I couldn't even hear myself think.

As to the sermon, I couldn't figure out if I agreed with what he said or not; since I guessed half of what he said.

I'll try and make it to their bible studies instead, which are on Friday nights. There really is no other (protestant) church that I know of here, and the main thing I really miss, is the teaching and the church fellowship with people. It would be easier to understand what they believe in a discussion context, and work something out from there.
I really really miss my church and the people now =(