Finally, a language I'm supposed to understand.

I loved being in Spain. I was able to conduct most of my business ("I need a 2-day metro ticket." "I want to go to Barcelona on Sunday night. No seats left on Sunday? How about Monday night?" "How much does this cost?" "Can I try this on?") and some of my play ("I'm 23 years old." "Do you work or study in Madrid?" "Who is your handsome friend?") in Spanish. I was delighted.

And frustrated. Our Spanish conversations never got far beyond our education, work, and opinions on the weather. My next home? Probably in a Spanish-speaking country.

The fellow I stayed with in Madrid is from Segovia. He and his friends go back every weekend (everyone who lives in Madrid seems to hate living in Madrid) and they invited me to go along. First David and his roommate Carlos accompanied me back to the train station so I could purchase my ticket to Barcelona, and then went with me to the Reina Sofia, a fantastic art museum. They gave up after about 30 minutes to go home and siesta. I finished my visit, woke them up, and we took a bus to Segovia, which is, according to them, the most beautiful city in the world.











Indeed, it may be.

And those guys are lots of fun, too.





Back in Madrid, I:

* went to the Prado.
* spent too much time on the metro.
* bought shirts.

Also, there was a bullfight involved. I'll get back to you on that.

Where I come from, we tried to avoid situations like these.

When I think Spain, I think bullfight. Not so much with Portugal, but as it turns out, it's a beloved tradition there, as well. Portuguese bullfighting is also far more interesting than Spanish bullfighting.

For starters, the Portuguese cavaleiros fight on horseback. They also don't kill the bull -- which is why they're not called matadors. Killing the bull is illegal in Portugal.

At the fight I attended, there were two cavaleiros, a father and son, and one Spanish matador, so I got to see the best of both worlds, without the killing (I caught that in Spain a few days later). As I said, killing the bull is illegal, so the matador takes a little spear and drives it into the bull's back, instead of using a sword. Same motion, different result.

Sometimes, says my Lisbon friend, the crowd starts chanting, "Kill! Kill! Kill!" when a Portuguese ring hosts a Spanish matador. Sometimes, the matador does it. Always, he goes to jail.

We start with a cavaleiro. He dances around, gets the bull to chase him a bit,



then backs away, lifts his spear,



and runs toward the bull, which by that point is generally running toward him. He fakes right, goes left, and uses his right hand to drive the spear into the bull's back. Applause, applause. This is repeated about six times.

Then the best part.

The cavaleiro leaves, and these eight little men in brown suits jump over the fence. (For today, their official titles will be "Loonies".) One of the loonies puts on a little elf hat and approaches the bull. (Well, struts toward the bull. There is a lot of strutting in the bullfighting ring.) The looney gets closer and closer until the bull charges him. (Which sometimes takes awhile -- the bulls are awfully tired by this point.)

The looney then grabs the bull's head and holds on. A second looney jumps on the first looney, and then five other loonies dog pile the bull's head. The eighth looney grabs his tail. And there they sit, eight loonies and a bull, who is bewildered, I've no doubt.



The seven loonies simultaneously spring away, leaving the eighth looney holding a bull's tail.



The remaining looney, holding tight, gets the bull to pull him in a circle. He jumps away when he's had enough, struts out of the ring,



and that's the end of round one.

Then cavaleiro #2 did his thing,



then we had the matador.

None of these guys works alone, by the way. There are a handful of other matador-esque people with pink capes (for lack of the actual term) who distract or rile up the bull, as appropriate.

More on Spanish bullfighting when my entries catch up to Madrid, which is soon. Just to get a little taste, here is a shot of our hero in Portugal. Note that he has his red cape. This means we're nearing the end -- he actually starts with a pink cape, like his matador-helpers. By the time he gets the red cape, he has sword in hand and he's working alone.

Lisbon: More Than Just a Cow Parade

I was in Lisbon for four days, which was actually quite a lot for Lisbon, at least for me in Lisbon.









I stayed with a stranger-now-friend, Renato, who hung out with me the entire time, which was fantastic. We watched six movies, three in the theater and three at home. From them, I must recommend Hard Candy.

The thing is, three of the four museums I cared to see were closed for stupid reasons. So, that opened up a lot of time.

Important things accomplished in Lisbon:

1. Cows. We know that.

2. Lots of walking around.



3. Cherry brandy tasting.

4. A day-trip to Sintra, which was actually about a one-hour trip, as the castle I cared to see there was closed, and the other castle was on a giant hill. It was really hot outside, people.





5. The Portugal/France game, despite the loss.

6. Cod. So much cod. Renato's mother made lots of cod.

7. I bought new sunglasses, since I lost my old ones on the bus from the airport in Faro to Lagos.

8. The Castelo de Sao Jorge.









9. A bullfight. More on that later.

The Great Cow Hunt

I was in Lisbon in the middle of The Cow Parade, which...well, it...so funny...you've gotta understand, I...not enough...you know, I really love.... Well. Just...here.

Beaches and bars, continued.

I'm back. I promised these things.







and (introducing my new hair)





The other best thing about Lagos was that Portugal played against England during my stay there. We watched the game in a bar -- there were only two Portuguese people in the place, but what they lacked in number they made up for in spirit. The game was intense, but "we" (sure, I claimed them) pulled it off. Of course, they played France a few days later, when I was in Lisbon, and lost. Sadness.

Beaches and bars.

Oh, I´ve missed the beach.

I spent three nights in Lagos, Portugal, which isn´t so much Portugal as it is Canada, Australia, England, and the United States all balled together. But, ultra-touristed or not, it´s still a beautiful place. Pictures pending. I´ll have those here in two weeks, when I get back.

Really, I just wanted to touch base, to remind you that I´ll be gone for a time and probably won´t write much more here until I get back. So, more on Lagos later, and, of course, Lisbon, (where I am now), and, of course, my hair.

It always grows back.

Those who email me regularly are probably aware of the battle I've had with my hair for the past several months. I've been short-haired most of my life, so this accidental journey into long hair over the last year has been delightful and educational. And somewhere along the line, I grew quite attached to it.

This surprised me. I was always the one who changed my hairstyle with every visit to the salon, the one who said, "Do whatever you want" to my stylist (I miss you, Carmen -- I sort of want to go red again). It always grows back.

But then it was really long. And suddenly I realized "growing back" meant a year of bad hair days rather than a couple of months of putting it under a scarf.

I went into salons in Germany, Poland, Ireland, and the Netherlands, but I always backed out. For the first time in my life, hair was a big deal.

And it's not that I had exceptionally pretty long hair. I didn't. But it felt sexy, so who cares what it actually looked like?

You know me. When I go, I go all out. And I left the salon today missing about 10 inches of hair.

It was the most miserable haircut of my life. It didn't help that before she started, the stylist said, "Are you sure?" Not exciting. Scary.

Which is why it had to be done. Hair. Useless vanity. It's embarrassing to admit I actually cared to see it go.

It was intense. It's still touch and go. But I'm slowly remembering that this is fun, too.

Two hours later, I'm here at a hostel in Utrecht, killing time before what needs to be a very early bedtime. I have to be at the airport by about 5:30 tomorrow morning to catch my flight to Faro, Portugal, and there is no way to make those connections from Den Dungen, so I had to get close to a train station where trains leave early and where I could find a place to stay. Utrecht it is, and I'm due on board at 4:07.

Four-letter words.

Yesterday, I was hauling Pete inside to eat when he screeched, "Fyeck!" which gave me pause. Had he just said what I thought he said?

"What was that, Pete?" I asked.

He looked at me, wide-eyed.

"Is that Dutch, Pete? What does that mean?"

"I not know that," he said. Uh, oh.

There was nothing more about it until bath time, when I asked the boys to get out of the tub. This time Carl was the offender, and there was no mistaking that word.

What do you do? I haven't discussed with their parents how we're to handle swearing, as it has never come up before. Besides, it's really pretty funny. So I threw out the standard, "That's never a nice word to say. If you use it again, you'll have to go to bed at 7:00 tomorrow." Of course, he said it again. And now I have to remind him of this word and the fact that he said it so he remembers why he's being dealt the 7:00 bedtime.

Pete also informed me that he knows the s-word, but he doesn't know what the s-word means.

This comes on the heel of their middle finger discovery, which serves them with endless delight -- and punishment.

's-Gravenhage

Today I wore my new boots to The Hague. It was cold when I woke up and I jumped on the opportunity, even though riding home in the super-crowded train was agony.

I sort of had to make myself go to this city, because for whatever reason I didn't feel like I'd like it. But I did, despite the fact that I never quite got my bearings.

I took in two museums (free admission, thanks to my 17-euro museumjaarkaart, which grants access to more than 400 museums in the Netherlands -- I've done three thus far, and it has already more than paid for itself) which were excellent. The first was the prison gate museum. The tour was in Dutch, but I was given a handy English leaflet. Besides, you don't really need language to understand torture instruments and jail cells. Very interesting place.

The second was the smallish Maurithuis, which is home to Vermeer's Girl With a Pearl Earring. Lovely.

Walking. Shopping. Eating cheap Indonesian food. The usual. I'm sleepy but still planning to head out with the group tonight.

I was a big hit in The Hague. I think it was the boots.

Long time no

Our internet has been down for a week, so I've been a little out of touch. Also, I have yet to find places to sleep in Portugal and Spain.

I'm getting into this World Cup thing, which, if I remember correctly (or don't remember, as it were), is largely ignored back home. It's exciting because I get two teams -- USA and Holland -- but, of course, the U.S. just lost to Ghana, so my hopes are resting on my adoptive land.

I've been lying low, saving the funds for the Spain/Portugal adventure, and working quite a bit.

Summer is lovely. We get some of it about every three days.

Interrupting your regularly scheduled program.

The only real reason I have for writing today is to tell you I bought a pair of boots. Yes, I know it's summer and there will be no bootwearing for a few months, or at least until the next time it rains, but they were beautiful and on sale and they fit. (Many of the shoes I try on here are too narrow for my apparently monstrous American feet.) I have boots! I have boots!

While I'm here, I might as well point out that today "work" meant swimming for two hours while nobody drowned. That's all I'm saying.

I amsterdam.

My first visitor!

My friend Drew from high school is backpacking Europe this summer, and he found himself in the Netherlands for a few days. He stayed with me for two nights -- as luck had it, I only had to work a few hours on one day the whole time he was here. We hung out at the lake, had a Heineken, and shopped the market in Den Bosch. Then we went to Amsterdam to meet up with his friend, Aaron, who is going to be with him for the rest of the summer.



We went to the Heineken Experience, which probably isn't something I'd have done alone, so I was glad for the opportunity. You know me. I don't like beer that much. I didn't expect much from the museum. But I had a blast. I was non-stop delighted.

It provides a history of Heineken beer making and all sorts of fun diversions for the kid-at-heart type of people. You can join a music video and email it to your friends. There are all sorts of random Heineken things with which to photograph yourself. There's a hologram of a beer maker -- he catches you looking in the window at his work and he rushes to shut the curtain. You have a moment where you sort of freak out in embarrassment -- "Oh, my gosh, he caught me, I'm sorry, man" -- and then you freak out in embarrassment again because he isn't real. There's a 3-minute show where you find out what it's like to be a Heineken beer bottle. I love this place.







We spent the night in Haarlem, and then did some shopping there this morning -- which included a visit to the world's greatest used book store. I love that place, too.

I think I'll be spending many more free days in Amsterdam. So much to do.

And it was great to see Drew and Aaron.

"I not gonna do that again."

"Amanda, come here!" Carl said. He sounded so excited that I stopped what I was doing and went over to the boys, who were sitting on the trampoline, enthralled with something. They had been playing with their new "shooting things" -- toys guns that spit little yellow balls about 3/4 the size of a pea.

Surely you see where this is going. I didn't at the time. Not yet.

"What's up?" I asked.

"Pete has a ball in here!" Carl replied, poking his finger in Pete's ear.

WHAT!? "Stopstopstop!" I cried, and broke into a run. I took Pete's head in my hands and looked in, but there was no ball to be seen. "Are you sure it's in there?" I asked, a question met by an enthusiastic "Yes!" from both boys.

I couldn't see it. "Okay, Pete. We're going to have to go to the doctor."

He started crying. I couldn't blame him. I'd have done the same thing.

After I got him calmed down, I asked, "Pete, why would you stick this in your ear?"

"I not know it wouldn't come out."

Right.

Well, it's a holiday, so the doctor in town isn't available. Rick and Carien are both gone. I woke up the young kids and headed next door to beg for assistance. They called the hospital in Den Bosch and took Pete there. I love nice neighbors.

They were back an hour later with news that the little ball had been stuffed five centimeters into Pete's ear. Six centimeters would have meant an operation. Whew. "And," said the neighbor woman, "the doctor suggests throwing all the little balls into the garbage."

"Sounds fine with me."

"No, I not want that!" Pete cried.

"And I didn't want you to put them in your ear," I said.

A pause. "I not gonna do that again."

The bits, the pieces.

I usually don't write here unless I have something interesting (well, at least interesting to me) to say. I don't really have that today, but I'm typing, anyway, because I'm bored, and maybe you are, too. This should be good.

I failed to mention that I went to see A Month in the Country at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. Having studied the Abbey in my theatre history classes, this was a big deal. And it was a good show.

If you haven't read Angela's Ashes, do so. Despite its monumental sadness, it's uproariously funny.

I might actually take the train north to Amsterdam this Saturday. I think I haven't yet because there's just too much to do there; where do you start? With Saturday. Maybe. If the weather clears a bit and I'm feeling motivated enough to do something besides page through travel guides.

Seriously, this cold/rain business is starting to suck. That's fine, indeed fantastic, when you call it "winter," which we were doing when I got here in January. Now it's the same, but it's called "spring" and I'm not buying it.

Something I do here that I don't do at home: iron. I have to iron the kids' stuff, that's in the job description. But now I even iron my own stuff. Half the time, anyway.

Something I don't do here that I will do at home: take more care with what clothes I put in the dryer. I've never shrunk anything I own (I guess because when in doubt, I threw it over my chair or the doorknob or the end of the bed to dry) and it must have given me a dangerous cocky carelessness with the dryer. My spirits remain high, although I've been banned from placing anything in the dryer ever again.

Ed is crawling and sitting himself up. He also won't lie still, which turns diaper- and clothes-changes into mini wrestling matches. They are more difficult to win than you might think.

I've got Kate doing the "yo"(ga), which she loves. "Kate, do you want to do some yoga?"

"Yo," she says, and shifts into tree pose.