Badajoz and Mérida

Sports bar of ham? Does life get any more manly?

Juan restored this statue.  He had to be to work early in the morning, so he let me drive his car to Merida. Scott was a good co-pilot. I loved driving in Spain. It made me feel more like a local for a minute. :)

Lunch in Merida was a the cutest little restaurant for tapas. Then to another trendy place for more tapas. Why don't we eat like Spaniards here in the States?

I took a picture of this lighting in hopes that I could someday replicate it at my music store.

Our fearless guide to history and food!

I have never learned so much on a trip. I loved hearing about all the history and the stories of the restorations.

After lunch in Merida, we stopped at an old-school drink counter for some horchata. The horchata in Spain is so much better than the stuff here, which is fake horchata-flavored sugar water.

Our friends, the Altieris and the Correas, live in Badajoz. It's the capital of Extremadura, on the border between Spain and Portugal. When we stayed there, we stayed in Sonia's house, which was lovely. Juan works in Merida, a 30-minute drive from Badajoz. He has worked in a museum that houses Roman artifacts from the region. In fact, when I stayed in Badajoz with the Correas in about 1992, Juan showed me around the site and the brand-new museum.  Now, it's bigger, I think. It was so interesting having Juan show us around the museum. He has worked on many of the restorations, so he showed us which parts of statues were reproductions, and taught us about restoration. During Roman times in Spain, many retired senators and dignitaries were given a parcel of land in this region for retirement. We also learned that Emperor Trajan and his son Emperor Hadrian were born in Sevilla. How about that?

These are some pretty incredible excavations.

Ruby and Victor went to an overnight party at the country home of Victor's friend Teresa, and Sofia went out with friends, so it was just the adults for dinner. Meanwhile, Ruby was in the countryside with a group of unsupervised, pot-smoking hard-drinking Spanish teenagers. She stuck to her guns about not partaking, and entertained the others with her rapping skills. She didn't have anything but the Articles of Faith memorized, so she rapped those. I can just see her. "We believe in God the eternal Father and in his son..." All to a beat. Ruby was excited to meet Victor's friends. The two times she has stayed in Badajoz, it was summer holiday and the friends were all out of town. She has only known most of them on social media the past few years, so it was fun to meet in person. They had a great time and stayed up most of the night.

Meanwhile, Scott and I went with Sonia to a Holy Week procession and then met Sonia's brother Jose and Juan for dinner at a Portuguese restaurant. Everything we ate in Spain was family style, and so good, fresh and delicious. Jose lives in The Hague and works for Interpol, so his English is great. He sat by Scott while I struggled with my Spanish with Sonia. I was pleasantly surprised by how much Spanish came back to me. Being able to communicate inspired me to try to get better at Spanish in the future. My skills are severely lacking. The last time I saw Jose, he was a teenager. He turned out to be a dashing, affable and congenial police officer. We very much enjoyed our time with him.

After a relaxed, lengthy dinner, the procession was still going on. The floats are carried by a bunch of people underneath who are bearing the burden as a form of penitence. The floats are very heavy, and the people carrying them have to have their steps choreographed for turns and stops. There are guys calling out instructions to them, and when a float turns a corner, there is a relieved smattering of clapping from the audience. For the most part, though, the audience is pretty reverent. This was after midnight, and families were just out, socializing and watching the procession. Kids and babies just roll with it.

The caps are an ancient tradition from the Nazarene brotherhood. Without the lens of American history, specifically the stupid Ku Klux Klan, I think the caps might still be a scary image. I don't know, though. I'll never be able to separate if from the Klan, and that's annoying.

Sonia left instructions for Scott and me to go to the tourism office where she knows everyone, and ask for our swag bags. We explored early in the morning and found the office, along with a great museum surrounding some ancient ruins of Badajoz. Even though we didn't have Juan to guide us, we enjoyed the museum. And our swag bags were packed with cool note pads, posters, toys and goodies. Thanks Sonia!

Badajoz is a beautiful city.

Swag bags!

Really cool book store where you can order churros and then be completely forgotten.

On this street, Scott and I had the funniest experience. We saw a cool cafe/book store, so we went in, ordered some churros and sat down at a table in the next room. We waited. After awhile, a guy came in to turn off the light for siesta, and was surprised to find us sitting there. I could have sworn I had a whole conversation, complete with hand gestures and visual aids, such as pointing to the churros and saying "dos, por favor," and the guy saying sure, etc. The language barrier is real.

Enjoying the sunshine, the blossoming orange trees, two tonic waters and a plate of olives. Ahhh.