Pais Vasco (Basque Country) May 25th through June 3rd

Sigh.... Where do I begin here? It's a good thing I brought my diary wherever I went to jot down notes because otherwise I would have forgotten everything that happened (no thanks to Unai!)

When I mentioned to my friends in Madrid that I was heading up north to visit my friend Unai near San Sebastian, they all jokingly cautioned me not to get blown up by ETA, a group that has a tendency to, well, blow things up. Not everything, of course-- just things that have anything to do with the Spanish government, including the occasional civil servant or judge. I won't go into the whole history of this that and the other but only mentioning this as a point of reference for a few of the experiences I'm about to tell later. They speak a totally different language not related to Spanish, (or Latin for that matter) have a distinct culture separate from Spain, and look quite different as well (more on that later.) In a nutshell, many of the Basque feel that their "country" should be separate from Spain, and ETA is the extremist group fighting for that cause. Sorta like the NRA and the UK.

Anyway, met up with Unai and the first night we went to a few bars, and noticed right away that the beer bottles they served were much smaller-- they call them "ratitos," so that you can down one fairly quickly and move on to the next bar. Interesting concept. "Let them drink faster, so they can leave faster, and come back faster later on in the night, when they'll be really drunk!" Well, since it was my first night in, I didn't let Unai test that concept out on me, just yet.

The second day we went up to San Sebastian, a small coastal city that is normally packed during the summer. But it was still early on (and raining like mad) and the beaches were empty. So we hiked up a small hill and on our way up, Unai told me to check out this plant off the trail. I looked at it, nothing really interesting, but he told me to break off a branch. I did, like the naive idiot I was, and right after began to feel a burning sensation on my finger! That cabron! Right after that happened, it started raining like crazy. Apparently, the gods were not happy with this little joke he played on me. We ran down the hill in the rain, just in time for beer o'clock!

Before we walked into this bar, I want to show you a picture I took of a sign that gently reminded us where we were:


So we walk into this bar, and there's nothing Spanish about it all. Pictures of ETA members who were in prison were prominently displayed, headlining the bar. In the back of my head, I was thinking, I probably shouldn't be here. But, Unai brought me, so I figured I'm good. We joked that if I stayed any longer than a week, I'll probably end up with a picture up on the bar one of these days-- perhaps as the first Chinese member of ETA! We met a Columbian dude in this bar (or was it a different one?) who told us he originally planned on being in San Sebastian for two months. When I asked him how long he'd actually been here, he said, "ten years." (Greg, I'm sure you'll appreciate that one!) Anyway, we started talking a bit here and there, and I asked him what he misses most about Columbia. I was expecting him to say something like, the food, the weather, the people, his machine gun (he IS Columbian right???!!) Nope, none of that. He answered, "Mi madre." At that point, I kind of laughed a little, but not too much because I didn't want to piss him off or anything. Your never know, he could have been Pablo Escobar's brother or something. Anyway, out of all my travels throughout my life, I think that's the first time I ever heard anybody ever say that!

After that bar, we went to Unai's favorite tapas joint, where they served fresh mussels in various sauces. Some good stuff and really hit the spot after a long day of hiking and beering. Tried to finish a gigantor stein of beer...


...but couldn't quite make it. I had to wave the white flag because after five plates of mussels, two plates of potatoes, and a plate of calamari, I just couldn't do it. So what did we do? We went to another bar!



Three American girls were speaking English and I overheard a few words here and there and quickly determined they were from California. I politely told them that speaking English in this area is illegal, and could be a risk to their safety, of course. Anyway, we had a couple more drinks with the three of them-- Alison from Orange County, Kristina from LA, and another Christina from Cali as well. Beer o'clock rolls around and all of a sudden Unai and I realized we had about 5 minutes to catch the last train out of San Sebastian back to his hometown of Beasain. We did our best to run (ok, fine, stumble) over but sure enough, we missed the train. Fortunately, we did not have to spend the night at the train station in spoon formation, as there was one other train heading towards Barcelona that made a stop in his town. When we got on the train, I told Unai to make sure we didn't miss the stop, lest we end up in Barcelona. I passed out right away on the train (those of you who know me well should not have been surprised) and woke up three seconds later (or at least, that's how it felt like) in Beasain. Ladies, thanks for making us miss our train. At least Unai got a good workout-- he complained about his sore "piernas" for the next three days.

The next day, we spent hanging out in his friends bar in the morning (it's happy hour somewhere in the world, right?) Unai and I were just hanging out when the telephone at the bar rings. Typically, when somebody calls the bar and asks for a patron, the bartender will call out, "Anybody by the name of so and so here?" But at this bar, the bartender brought the phone directly to Unai and said, "It's for you, your mom wants to speak with you."

We ran into a friend of his at the bar, Olano, who didn't really seem like he was playing with a full deck of cards. We started chatting for a bit, and I accidentally said something to the effect of, "I've been here in Spain for about a day...." To which he responded quite sternly, "You mean, Pais Vasco...." Point taken. Anyway, an African comes into the bar and is peddling a package of ten pairs of socks to Olano at a cost of 16 euros-- which roughly equals to about $24-- expensive, right? Olano and the African go back and forth for awhile and finally agree on a price-- 6 euros, which is about $9. Not bad, right? But these socks were the cheapest looking things I've ever seen come out of China that will probably disintegrate after one wash. Olano, however, thinks it's such a great deal after having negotiated down from 16 euros, he buys the guy a drink in the bar! Not five minutes later, a couple of his friends come into the bar to tell Olano that they must go and settle some "issue" at the police office. He immediately runs out of the bar and leaves his treasured socks behind. I imagine that in about a year, his picture will be headlining some bar in Beasain.

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The next day, we head to his sister and brother-in-law's place with Unai's parents for the weekend. Laida is Unai's older sister, and reminds me very much of my sister Vanessa, who is also the same age as Laida. Laida also has three kids, Ibai, 5, Nile, 2, and an 11 month old baby (can't remember her name!) Ruben, Unai's brother-in-law, is a huge sports fan and knows more about all the foreign players in the NBA than I do. "Luis Scola, ah yes, the backup center playing in Houston behind Yao Ming..... Fabricio Oberto, ah yes, he plays for San Antonio....." The next time he shows up in LA, I'm definitely taking him to a Lakers game. Ibai reminds me very much of my nephew, Payton, who is also 5. He loves to play sports and we spent most of the weekend throwing stuff, kicking stuff, and just having a blast. Unai's mother is a riot as well-- very outspoken about many things and is convinced that you can catch cavities from kissing somebody else. Unai's dad and is a character-- a couple of times he would point out something on my shirt and quickly thumb his finger on my nose once I looked down. I thought that stuff was what you did at, I don't know, my age. But he's keepin it real.

Over the week I was in Beasain, it rained every freakin day. In fact, it was the worst rainstorm in over 25 years, complete with flooded houses and roads. So, what did I decide to do? As a token of appreciation for the family's generous hospitality, I decided that I would cook a good ole' fashioned bbq for them on Sunday. Finding certain ingredients was a bit difficult to find, but eventually settled on picking up some Hunt's BBQ sauce and chicken wings and drumsticks. It was a crowd pleaser, and I was happy to have given them little bit of a taste of America.

We went out one night, and met a few ladies and had a blast talking about the cultural differences between America and Spain. One of the girls asked me if I ate dog, and I said, no, only my grandparents did when they were stricken with poverty and had no other choice when they were in China. I was not offended by this question, because it wasn't out of racism, nor malicious intent, it was just that she did not know any better. There aren't many Chinese (or minorities for that matter) in this country. Anyway, another girl, Maria, had pretty white teeth-- which is not the standard here (or anywhere outside of America, for that matter) She kept refusing to smoke a cigarette from Unai, for fear that it would stain her teeth. So I gave her a stick of my Extra Polar Ice gum that I brought from the US and told her that it's good to chew gum after eating or drinking. She liked it so much I decided to give her my whole pack. Good times overall-- the women here don't get all antsy and uppity when approached by men (as they often do in the US) They're very open to conversation, and also, to my surprise, do not expect you to buy them drinks, either!