Y ella dijo...

... 'Lo siento, yo soy una vegetariana...'

O, life. Let it be known, obviously, that I am in some way compromising my, morality? by consuming dairy and egg products here. Honestly, though, I've barely had cheese--and not in any prepared dishes--and I've had only half an egg. And the cheese was okay, but I haven't had REAL, DELICIOUS, FRESH cheese, which I'm totally looking forward to in Italia, and maybe Türkiye. My problem here has definitely been meat and otherwise had-a-soul products. And, as most people may know, I'm vegetarian mostly for the 'voting with my fork' reasons against factory farming and all the waste incurred in the process of consuming animal products. Here, though, most of the dairy and whatnot is very local and isn't all icky and pesticidey and hormonye, et cetera. The culture is different, so my reasons can't stand up as well. That, and the fact that most of the people in this world are starving, and 20.000 children died to-day because of their lack of access to potable water, so why am I complaining. I'm blessed with food choice. Yes, but it is exactly because I have this choice that I choose veganism. Also, in the way that most people find cannibalism 'wierd' or 'wrong,' I find eating something that was alive like animals are 'weird,' 'wrong,' or what have you.

That said, Spaniards eat the most fish in the world next to Japanese. Also, here in Aragón, they eat a lot of meat. And, obviously, because I'm not some snobby, high-maintenance, American tourist, I've learned to pick around some meat. And I understand that pretty much everything is cooked in animal something. I, however, will enjoy being alive to see Türkiye, so I eat. Today, at this little restaurant, I ordered an ensalata, which came second (and with tuna), and patates. When the patates came, joy of joys, they were in a shrimp and other seafood liquid sauce thing. I have learned in the past two days, also, that I hate how fish tastes. And smells. So I tell those sitting around me that someone is going to eat this seafood so as not to waste it. I pull out one shrimp tail to give it and, lovely, it's attached to--guess what?--a shrimp head.

Yes.

Mind you, I'm sitting next to a food economist who didn't grow up in America and doesn't totally understand the whole vegan thing and thinks that it is more a, shall we say dietary? choice rather than a, lifestyle? Veganism, to me, is a philosophy, I suppose. I'm not vegan because I'm some privileged little white girl who's too good to eat meat. It's also somewhat spiritual, but that's a whole other story. So Aysen is saying something like, 'Well, come on now, just give the shrimp,' but it has a HEAD! I was NOT expecting that. There are vegetarians on this group, too, and people are being quite nice, knowing that I'm not some priss, and they say, 'O, don't make her.' 'Look at the poor thing...'

And I almost start crying.

That's right. I hate crying. Also, you can imagine how stupid I felt. It was all just too, too much. You have to understand, though, that here I am with a shrimp head in mine hands and all that I want to do is eat some damn vegetables that aren't soaked in things that are supposed to stay INSIDE ANIMALS, thank you.

All in all, I can forage pretty well, but eating is weird here, too, without dinner (well, it's dinner at 2200) and with lunch that is mainly tapas, which are pre-made, and not vegetarian-friendly. Enter Clif bars, which poor Sonja (Sonya?), who can't have gluten, totally appreciates.

I think that this little rant is over. It's just a bit frustrating trying not to be high-maintenance and eat, especially in a group. Things will get better when we have more freedom to eat on our own, but until then, 'Lo siento. Yo soy una vegetariana...'

I talk to vegetables. I speak vege.

And others do not.

'and here in Spain I am a Spaniard'

Bienvenidos a España, y un viaje del bus del cuatro horas. One awesome thing is that I'm finally in a country that uses the metric system, so my stubborn quirky way of understanding distance, speed, temperature, and even hours (all post times are my local time, whatever it is on any given day, but all posts change together)  is now normal. It's 23 out, and we're sies horas ahead of EST. All this said, the following comment should make sense: I swear that we were going 60, 70 tops the whole time when the speed limit was 120.

The flight over wasn't as long as I expected, and I had my first food improvisation practice complete with non-vegan excursions. We had a chat about identity crisis, but my organic hemp day pack is a nice surrogate for veganism for now. We landed, hopped on the bus, and then drove to Zaragoza, settled (the nice man at the front desk, when reading my passport to hand it back to me, said in Spanish something like, 'Your name is very difficult to pronounce, so, Maria!'), ate, debriefed, and acknowledged our collective tiredness and broke for the rest of the evening. I see sleeping, swimming, and unpacking--not necessarily in that order. Right now, though, the tinto de verano from lunch is making everyone's siesta lovely, I'm sure.

Blunders:

--Walking into an open window when all that I was trying to do was carry my 13 kg backpack duffle and 6 kg day pack up stairs.

--Accidentally shocking myself by somehow mysteriously holding my adapter that has too-wide pins in the socket.

--Thinking that the soap was, in fact, chocolate, but thank goodness I didn't eat it. Who puts chocolate in the bathroom, anyways?

*BUT I totally organised the set-up of my wireless connexion in broken Español.

Seeing the Expo will prove to be very interesting, as will the rest of these studies. The countryside on the way here was just as much a story of the poor people living along the autovia as was anything else. The random tracts of green grew to surprise me, and the little red flowers and bunches of purple flowers delighted me. I wished to walk barefoot in a summer dress and straw hat, picking flowers, and then lie in the hayfield under a scraggly tree eating fruit from Aragon until my eyes closed.