Nothing really exciting happened today, so I'll take this as another chance to talk about something that's really different between Spain and the States: food.
First, breakfast. In the States, it's a big deal. Americans love brunch. We love coffee and waffles and bacon and eggs and IHOP and orange juice and the whole production of breakfast in bed and all that fun awesome stuff. In Spain, breakfast (el desayuno) is exactly that -- break "des" fast "ayunas". A cup of coffee if you're lucky like I am, and a couple mini muffin things, and that's it. Maybe an apple to eat on the way to school or work, but even that is rare. So that´s thing number one.
Next up, lunch. LUNCH IS A BIG DEAL IN SPAIN. It's the biggest meal of the day, honestly. Both size-wise and importance-wise. Usually businesses close around 2:00 so everyone can go home for comida y siesta. Oh yeah, that's another thing you don´t learn in Spanish 1 back in high school -- "almuerzo" is like an afternoon snack, and "comida" is the real deal. With my class schedule I don't have enough time to go back and eat during the afternoon, so my madre packs me a bocadillo (like a sub, but usually just with meat and cheese or tortilla de patata like I had today) to take to school with me and eat there. But anyway, everyone goes home and chows down on a huge lunch and then rests and digests for a little bit and then businesses open back up around 5 or so and close at 8 or 9. Which brings us to...
La cena, or "dinner". Since la comida is so much later in the day than traditional lunchtime in the states, it sort of pushes everything else back a little bit too. And, as I have heard Rachel explain to people probably sixteen times, people around the world generally eat dinner when the sun goes down, and the sun here literally does not go down until 10 PM. Which is awesome. SO, with la comida y siesta and businesses staying open until 9 and the sun not going down until 10, la cena is generally around 9 or so. Before 8 PM, absolutely unheard of. In my casa we usually eat between 8:30 and 9:30, but I've sat down to dinner at 10:15 and it's totally normal.
So with everything pushed back so far and people not even done eating until 10 PM, what does that all mean when it comes to going out at night? It means that we don't even leave until midnight. Which, for Rachel and me, is completely normal cause that's how we roll in Charlottesville anyway. However, all of the establishments here have completely adapted to this whole schedule thing that we have going on, and so, as I have mentioned before, nothing really gets going until 2 or 3 AM. Cool, right?
One last thing though -- since nothing gets crazy before 2 AM and you don´t even get home until after 6 AM, you´d think maybe people sleep in or something to make up for it. Nope, you just get right back up at 8 AM even if you've only had two hours of sleep, and you chug your coffee and eat your mini muffins and grab your bocadillo and continue on your way.
Hasta luego!
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