Tourism!



I loved Porto. I think it's one of those cities that's been waiting for me for a while, so that even the pink guys in hats didn't bother me really. We also saw some local corners I wouldn't have found without Hannah or without getting lost. And oh the fishes we ate. So many creatures disappeared that weekend. Well.

But mostly we didn't photograph that place. Half the time I was by myself, which is a wonderful way to travel. But sometimes I was in Lisbon (no photos) and in Sintra's fantasy castles,


in the sweep of this force:





So let's drink sweet wine in the name of love.

Sam's life in Uganda:

"My average day:
1. I eat bread and coffee
2. Walk up and down hills to Buiga sunrise
3. Perform tasks like poster making, class teaching, handywork, etc
4. Help teach computer class
5. Eat beans and posha (Posha is maize mash)
6. More tasks
7. Maybe play volleyball with friends
8. Long walk home
9. Help in making fire pit by starting a fire in the designated area
10. Make dinner or buy dinner and Senator beer with Adibo (the security gaurd)
11. Sleep
12. Other things include washing dishes, taking malaria pills,
showering (Bucket of water), etc."

Dani, 3rd grade's "bad boy" (cute glam shorthand for "unparented neglected and probably hit kid with lots of aggression and no attention span") (who I think has made a lot of progress this year, what with special tutoring etc., and the first time he raised his hand to answer a question I nearly cried, and since then he has paid more and more attention in class, although his contributions are usually shouted word-associations)(also he has a rattail and laughs "ha-ha" like the simpson's bully) drew me a picture.

Pictured: two blue clouds snowing on a centerpage mountain with a brown peak. A sun shies away from the clouds, openmouthed. The mountain says "R" (scribbled out) (ha, was it originally for the other teacher's assistant? Her name starts with "R") and "Para Soufi." Spongebob stands front and center, proffering hugs. To the right, in a sheer skirt and either yellow boots with striped tops or green pants with striped bottoms, I am climbing the mountain.



Do you remember how long it took to draw those "snow" pictures when you were in school? I remember the snowflakes getting bigger and bigger as I went along. Dani's are pretty even, but they don't reach the bottom of the page.

Also, can you tell? Spongebob's legs were erased and redrawn. My striped cuffs are six-tone. Kid worked on this. He put it on the teacher's desk as soon as he got in (tardy) and spent about half the class trying to signal that it was for me, then that I should open it. (Dani is about the only student in the school who hasn't figured out that I understand Spanish). After class I squatted by his desk and opened it, and he hid his face. Waaaaaaaah.

Waaaaah.

(Also it's funny that in all of 3rd grade it's the two most difficult students, I mean the two I have actually yelled at, who have drawn me pictures) (And who both think I am named Soufi).

Color Party!
In an effort to peel off our winter crusts (because scabbing hides infection) we threw a color party in our flat. The theme was color both in defiance of winter and to encourage our guests to wear something other than slimming black. It didn't really work:



But I guess super beautiful people have flower faces anyway. See my housemates, Ivan and Elodie and Ewan, flanked by Gonzalo and Patri:



Elodie and I made colorful food. Some of it also tasted good.



I guess it was a good party. Our couch got moved. This is Rosanil who uses her excellent English to call me "little fellow."



Unfortunately I fell asleep with a headache a sore throat and jetlag early on, on a pile of coats.

Then Hannah came! We ate. She should live here.

From the Salon:

Right


Left


Straight ahead.



My room from below.



My room from above.



The hall is not always so dark.



Honeys mines I've been, let's see, 3 months out of Madrid, um almost a month on New York's couches, this is math, um another week at home, I was in Germany for more than a week and then later one day more, I just can't count the houses and beds and friendships I crashed on, we'd better ellipse...I got into Madrid the 27th and I didn't move into anywhere until the night before last. I'm homestarved, I think in this state any old bunker would satiate, BUT: this house is sunripened, handpicked, local grown organic uh a 20 year old WOOFer named Michael with a beard played flute to it while it grew...it's a good apartment.



The street is called Costanilla de los Desamparados, which means "itsy sloping street of the Homeless." Which ho ho ho, feels right. We're certainly camping at the moment, unmoved in, unfridged beer and floorspace conferences.

It's Atocha zone (by the gorgeous train station), metro Antón Martin, officially part of the Barrio de las Letras, or Literature Neighbourhood, where famous phrases have been bronzed and hammered into the pavement.

Our flat! Right about Lavapiés, where we lived last year. It's up in the world, and it is where we have moved. The rooms are big and sunny, the hall is big enough to gallop up, down, wide enough to lean in and converse, all four of us plus someone's friends, the floors are wood (excepting that of the big chummy kitchen, which is brick)...there's a balcony in the living room, plenty of traffic noise tra la. We're all pretty in love at the moment, with the apartment and with each other for having stuck through and stuck together and found this THING, this beautiful sunny thing. Ewan already is making noises about staying in it more than the (age! age!) year we have contracted.

tomorrow i find out EVERYTHING. everything. times, places, fates, faces for the names. candy for the baby. all things!