Arriving in Spain was like one of those moments where you didn't realize
who or where you are, until you are there. All of a sudden, a lot of
things started to feel like they were falling into place. When I had first
started to plan this trip, I hadn't originally put Spain on the list. I
just felt like I didn't have that big of an interest in going. Basically,
I grew up in South Florida. The amount of Spanish heritage, history, and
culture that we were surrounded with and had forced down our throats in
school, left me feeling like i'd "been there, done that".
I can't even begin to tell you how thankful I am that I didn't let those
ignorant thoughts linger for too long. When Kim mentioned she wanted to go
there, I figured what the hell, we'll go. Stepping off that plane and into
sunlight and warmth for the first time in 3 months did a hell of a lot more
than any soul could realize. I felt like for the first time I had heard
about my friends death, I was on vacation.

It took landing in another country, where the warmth, the sunlight, the
palm trees, the language, and the cultural differences left me feeling like
I was somewhere new, and therefore I could begin something new. I could
and would have to learn to carry on and embrace the newness that death
leaves you embarassingly craving. Spain was a newness, spain was
beautiful. You absolutely can't understand the diversity of Europe, until
you see Spain, the dark-haired child in a see of blonde. The diversity
within its borders allows you to feel like you're experiencing history as
well as history in the making. We arrived in Valencia and before even
heading into the city center, kim and I sat on some cement blocks absorbing
every ounce of warmth we could gather. After about 30 minutes of allowing
frozen brains to thaw out, we were ready to raid this place for everything
it had to offer.

We found a hostel where the staff were majorly awesome, and because we were the only two there at the moment, they gave us our own room. NO SHARING (and no im not selfish, but damn i love having my own room). Our room was painted an amazing deep red color, and the sunlight burned through the orange curtains casting an aura of warmth which just left us both feeling
so calm and collected. Does anyone get the idea of how cold we had been
beforehand? We had a balcony that overlooked a spanish style courtyard,
surrounded by small eateries and cafe's. I swear it looked exactly like
the courtyard from the movie L'auberge Espagnole they pranced through after
their long night out.

After about 3 days of not showering because the guy putting us up in
Amsterdam had too many camera parts lying around his house, we tore into
those showers faster than oprah into a bigmac. Warm, clean, and somewhere
new, I could have just died in that moment. We decided to just take this
day easy, and as the hours passed us by, more and more guests arrived into
the hostel. We quickly made friends with some of the funnest people we
would end up travelling with for the remainder of Spain. There was
Marshall and Bruce, the two canadians who were like the perfect married
couple, karen, the australian living in munich germany, but most
importantly, her younger brother Richard. Me and kim took such a liking to
Richard that for the rest of Spain, we tormented this guy by constantly
chanting his name, punching him, forcing him to let us give him his
diabetic shots, relentlessly teasing him, and to this day I won't ever be
able to explain why. Richard was a piece of clay, and kim and i were rabid
molders (we miss you richard and su gato).

valencia manages to capture the essence of what spain is about, fun,
relaxation, and more fun. They still practice siestas here, which I can
never take advantage of cause I just can't sleep during the day, but I
can't say I didn't appreciate it. Around 2 in the afternoon, business and
restaurants close up, the streets become a bit quieter, as everyone is
inside sleeping off the fun they had the night before. Imagine living in a
place where you could party all the time, have to get up the next day for
work, but are then allowed to sleep for about 3 hours in the middle of the
day to help balance the obvious inequality that fun>work. it's that
simple. The Valencians know how to honor thy math.

Our second day there was fantastically inappropriate. We decided we'd go
see the mediterranean ocean...great idea, beautiful ocean, fantastic stones
on the beach, but even better is the exhibitionist who just waits for you
to look at him before he exposes himself. I happened to be the lucky
winner of the visual prize. I turned around, turned back quickly and
fiercly warned kim not to turn around, to get our shit together, and lets
go. He might have been only an exhibitionist, but I wasn't taken any
chances since we were the only people, other than sir peeks-a-lot, on the
beach. We kept going, walked about a mile in the other direction, and cut
across to another area of the beach. By this point, the sun was bidding us
adieu so we waited around, and caught a night bus back to the city.
Beautiful!

We experienced the infamous paella dishes (minus the fish for us), and
fantastic cafe con leche's, nightclubs, valencian aqua (an alcoholic
beverage famous in valencia), but importantly, most importantly, my first
experience with someone with tourettes. Tourettes is an interesting thing
to witness, but tourettes in another language is just grand. We were
sitting in a bar/cafe indulging in another coffee and cake, and i hear
someone behind me going mental on the computer. Cursing, typing, another
curse, some silence, PUTAH, click click, putah, click type type click.
that's what I'm talking about.

I really love valencia, but realized it was time to go on as there was so
much more to see. Marshall and Bruce had extended an invitation to us to
join them in Morocco, and at first I kept thinking it would be a bit out of
reach for us to catch up with them since they were leaving before us, but
after a while, we decided what the hell, we'd do it. So we were to trail
them by a day through 2 more cities, before we'd go on to morocco together.

We bussed into Grenada, home of the infamous Alhambra museum. Home to tons of side streets filled with ethnic markets, great tea houses, bars which
practiced the ingenious idea of tapas, and and and the most fantastic
eatery on earth called the "Kebab King". I would cut someone's right arm
off for their vegetarian empenada. So much feta cheese, green olives,
tomatoes, and other edible awesomeness, that you'd puke from the mere
excitement. We fully took advantage of that place, especially since for the
total of 3 euros, you'd get one hell of a meal.

By this point, our group of 4 had turned into about 10, and we ran around
these streets of grenada enjoying the one thing people just dont take
advantage of, being young and indifferent. You want us to pay to visit
this church? then forget it, im not visiting it. You want me to wake up
early to do what? yeah, see ya. you want me to just be one hell of a
basic human who eat, sleeps, and breaths fun? Better hurry and catch up
with us! that's how we ran those streets in grenada.

Eventually, after full hearts, minds, and stomachs, we went on to tarifa.
Tarifa is a tiny, and i stress tiny, little town which is the most southern
point in spain. Tarifa is the wind-surfing capital and from it's shores,
you can see Africa. You might not understand the power of that statement.
But seriously, how can you just look over and see Africa? It's not like
oh, there's england, oh there's the other side of the lake, no..here lies
AFRICA, and more specifically, we were seeing the skylights of Morocco. We
were so excited to just get there...but understood that tarifa itself had
quite a bit to offer in its quaintness. So for the 3 days we were there,
we relaxed, dreamt of Morocco, and took a sidetrip to Gibralter. Who the
hell goes to Gibralter? K and J do.

so we boarded more local buses, headed to La Linea, Spain, and walked
across the border to the U.K. territory of Gibralter. All of a sudden
people were driving on the other side of the road, and euros were no longer
accepted. The rock of gibralter is one of those things you know and hear
about, but you dont think you are ever going to see it, let alone be on it.
So we just went about our day on this rock, enjoying what we could with
the hours we had before the last local bus was heading back to Tarifa. We
ended up at the most southern point where there is a huge mosque and a
lighthouse. From the lighthouse point, we could once again see Africa.
This time we got smart. We set the camera up with my MP3 player up to the
camera sound input, and did a crazy dance to toto's "africa", and jumped
around waving and pointing to the African coast. Yeah so what, we're
rediculous, but we love us. A bus driver motioned to us to come on, the
bus was leaving, but we begged him for one more minute of dance time, so he
gave in, watched us laughing as we finished our tribute to toto and to
africa.

We arrived back in Tarifa, met up with bruce and marshall and planned our
course of action for the next day. We were going to catch an early ferry
over to Tangiers, Morocco. From there, me, richard, and kim were meant to
stay in Tangiers and head on to Fes, before heading back to Spain.
Marshall and Bruce were going to head down to Marrakech, and then work
their way upwards back to Spain. So we packed small bags, and I stress
small. I had nothing but a couple changes of underwear, a t-shirt, a scarf
I could use for a multitude of things, and some toiletries, and a charger
for our MP3 players. The next morning we woke up excited as hell, we were
going to africa!!!

We caught the ferry over, our excitement overshadowing the sea sick
feelings that tried to push through. Arriving in Tangiers was quite an
experience. We got off the boat, walked through customs, and were on our
way. We had no idea where we were going, what to expect, where to stay,
and most importantly, where the hell to find some food. we were all
ravished with hunger. After about 2 hours of hanging around the beach
areas and harassed by hash selling mobs, we found a cafe which would serve,
what would become the first of BESTS, and i stress best, coffee I have ever
had in my life. Morocco holds the gold for coffee. Damn do they know how
to brew and serve a cup of that love. After about 2.3 minutes of
persuasion, richard, kim, and I decided to stay with Marshall and Bruce.

We had the freedom to go wherever, but a flight leaving from Sevilla Spain
on the 15th to Barcelona. And if we wanted to at least some of Sevilla, we
would want to get there by the 13th. The current date was the 8th. So we
figured the only we could fit in Marrakech, Fes, Tangiers, and Sevilla, was
a lot of travelling at night, so we wouldn't be wasting any daytime. This
equated to the fact that almost every other night was spent sleeping on a
train. we could do it, we were tough, entertained, and ready for adventure
which means ready to sacrifice comfort.

The 5 of us set off to see the streets of Tangiers, and ended up wandering
through a market in which everything and anything you could want to
purchase was available. We decided to stock up on food for dinner and our
train ride. We ended up with a kilogram of figs, a bag of green olives,
amazing flatbred, bottles and bottles of water, bags full of tangerines,
and a monster jar of nutella. could a group of travellers really need
anything else? After arriving in the train station, Richard realized his
wallet was missing, and we quickly forced him to just kiss it goodbye,
since there was no way on earth we would be able to find in a crowded
market, who would have taken it, it was more like who wouldn't be capable
of taking it from his backpocket. Due to the time change between Tarifa and
Tangiers, which we only came to find out before our train was supposed to
leave, we were in the train station for about 2.5 hours. This of course
was solved by eating until we wanted to puke, and playing endless games of
asshole and other various card games. Our train finally arrived, and we
boarded for what was to be a 12 hour journey to the southern regions of
Morocco, to Marrakech.

We were so filled with excitement that the obvious didn't come into our
realm of realization; with 5 of us, 2 of the males being taller than 6', we
were going to have some space issues in these small second class train
compartments. Our compromise? Bruce slept on the luggage rack, and the
remaining 4 played a 12 hour game of slumber twister. Not so fun. But
ever so worth it.

Of course before we ever even had the need to think about these realistic
problems, we spent more time harassing the hell out of each other before
bedtime. We played a game of "who has the highest blood sugar level" since
Richard had all the diabetic tools a group of 5 bored youngsters could
dream of. Bruce won and freaked out until we had to calm him down by
reminding him he did eat more oranges than anyone else, and he probably
just had more residue on the finger we pricked. I lost the worst, and even
after eating tons of figs and oranges, I was at the bottom of the "normal"
range. So I kind of freaked out, but realized, ah whatevs, im in the
Roccs!!

Allright, I gotta head out right now, but I promise to get the rest of Morocco updated, as well as the rest of Spain and then everything since then, christmas, new years, birthday, and the final countdown!