Our team actually didn't stay in Ligo this year, but found a hotel in Pontevedra, about 40 kilometers away, instead. The Vigo hotels were all filled to capacity with the competitors and fans for an around-the-world regatta that began on Saturday afternoon. Our game began at about the same time. Jamila lamented this unfortunately poor timing of events, unable to catch more than a seconds-long peek through a taxi window at the amazing ships lined up and ready to race. She is a sailing aficionado. We noticed the intricate masts of some pirate-like models as we drove into the city, and Jamila's initial gasp of awe ended up a swallow of disappointment as our gym-bound taxi dove into a tunnel and carried us away from the port.
We don't take buses very often, unless the trip between airport and hotel or gym is more than an hour's drive. Instead, we pile into southern European-sized taxis four, often sweaty, northern European-sized chicas. It is not the most comfortable ride, especially when the high-pitched, old sweat stink of never-dry basketball shoes drifts forward from the bags in the trunk.
Six of us opted to take our dinner outside the hotel, and spent the evening wandering the very cold streets of Pontevedra searching for a tapas bar with enough room for half a basketball team. When we finally found the proper combination of table size, stool size, and heat, we ended up ordering three bottles of wine and a serving of everything on the menu. We munched on Spanish tortilla, calamari, croquetas, sausage, shrimp, and three types of octopi, with just about all of it soaked in oil.
We deserved a feast. Our week had been a bit dramatic, with the coaches and "directivos" having alternately taken away all of our human rights and then returned most of them with a new written set of team rules. As a thirty-year-old it seems a bit strange to be given an in-week curfew and bedtime by men who I am not even related to, and I'm glad they worked most of that out without me having to speak or habla-up.
By the end of the week our team rules allowed, once again, for us to be free to do as we pleased with our post-game weekend. We just have to make sure to ask for permission. Okay, I guess I can deal with that indiginity, as long as it's not accompanied by curfews and check-ins.
In the magazine that sits in the seat pocket under the tray table on every Iberia flight, there are a few pages that list all of the current cultural exhibits in every city in Spain. I like the magazine, because it has all of the articles in Spanish and English, so I can expand my vocabulary during the flights. A few weeks ago, Jamila noticed a Frida Kahlo exhibit running in Santiago de Compostela. She had an easy time talking Katja and me into another prospective journey. When she asked for permission to change our homebound flights, our coach remarked, "Ester wants to stay and see her boyfriend. You all want to stay and be culturally enriched..." He consented, of course.
So we spent our pre-game nap time in an internet cafe re-working our flight itineraries and re-checking the exhibit time. On Sunday morning, as the rest of the team was cabbing back to the airport, we were walking to the Pondevedra bus station down a dark and icy street, with our big, red, smelly gym bags slung over our shoulders.
You forget about cold when you cease to experience it in any direct way. It hits fifty here sometimes at night and with our heat still not working the sixty degree temps inside can be a bit uncomfortable. But I have my sweatshirts and my hats, and winter sort of disappears into the palm trees here in Ibiza.
Winter does not, however, disappear into the palm trees in Santiago de Compostela. We arrived in a sub-zero bus station at 9 in the morning. The sun was barely above the horizon. The sky was blue, mostly, with a few hazy clouds racing by overhead. The wind was biting. We observed that our bulky team jackets were merely big but not warm. I put a fuzzy ski-cap on my head and we set out to find the first of many coffees (cola-caos for me).
We took the right city bus into town, but missed our stop and ended up hiking a kilometer or two back into the city center. Jam limped along on her sore ankle and my back began to call attention to itself. Active basketball players don't necessarily make the best back-packer style tourists.
As we made our way into the city center, we noticed that nature was somehow defying its own laws. With a perfectly clear sky overhead, it was somehow snowing. We cackled a bit at our fortune in witnessing such a miraculous event in this city of miracles. Santiago de Compostela is the city at the end of the Camino, a hundreds-of-kilometers long route of pilgrimage for French and Spanish Catholics. Since the Middle Ages, the road has been traversed by pilgrims seeking spiritual growth in their quest to behold the purported remains of Saint James. Apparently, the bones of the great "Moor-killer" were discovered by a hermit in 813 AD through an angelic revelation. Since then, the town has reaped the rewards of a booming tourist industry during various ages, including our own.
Our pilgrimage this time around had another focus, and we skipped most of the Compostela sights, although I did snap a few shots of the Church and a large crowd "manifesting" in the square below it.
We were in the front of the line when the Frida exhibit opened at noon. The lay-out of the exhibit was exceptional, with rooms filled with general information about her life, photos of her and Diego Rivera, and several pieces of her work, including some from a private collection that is rarely open to the public. It was hard, however, to come face to face with such personal torture in canvas after canvas. The whole experience was very moving, and my words could not begin to do it justice so I will shy away from any further description.
We took our lunch in a building just a few meters from the exhibit's exit. Not long after that, we headed off, on foot, back to the bus station to retrieve the bags we'd left in lockers there and then made it to our afternoon flight back to Ibiza.
I feel so lucky to be able to experience Spain in small installments, one weekend, one exhibit at a time, and in between have a nice soft bed and real-life schedule to exist inside. I came home and crashed, slept ten hours, then woke up and began the life-tasks of laundry washing and hanging, grocery shopping, downloading pictures, and emailing all of the people I left at home. I wonder what I'll be writing home about next Monday...
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