Thursday, January 14, 2010

Seville: Our first exposure to the serious business of Flamenco

We arrived in Seville on Friday evening and the guy at our hostel told us about a free flamenco show going on later that night. And by "later," I mean wayy past our normal bed time; everything starts late in Spain!
We definitely couldn't say no to free flamenco, so we found the bar, and waited for the performance to start. We had fun spending time with the locals while trying to inhale as little second-hand smoke as possible.
Then the three performers came out: a guitar player, a singer/clapper, and a dancer. Initially I thought the dancer was actually the band's body guard due to her intimidating presence, her dramatic scowl, and her sideburns. But once she got going, she loosened up. Slightly.
It was fun to be part of the late-night crowd for once, and luckily we were outside all the next day so our clothes got to air out. :)

Seville is a beautiful old city on the river Guadalquiver with a neat mix of Moorish and European influences. It was occupied by the Moors for hundreds of years and when it was finally reconquered, the two cultures remained very intertwined.
Their huge cathedral (where Christopher Columbus is buried!!) is built using parts of the old mosque that was on the same site, and the royal palace in Seville was built by a Catholic king imitating the style of his Moorish predecessors.
And we just like this picture of Seville's bull-fighting arena because...don't you think it kind of looks like a bull? Finally, I just wanted to put this in for all of our Ticket to Ride playing friends. We didn't make it to Cadiz, but we took a picture with this mural in honor of the 20+ points for Cadiz to Stockholm.

5 comments:

Christy said...

Haha! Love the Cadiz picture! :-)

Natalie said...

Let the good times roll! Glad you guys are getting to do all these fun things!

Katherine Lewis said...

Amazing! I can't believe you are in Spain. Now I am officially jealous. I hope you're enjoying nice weather and SO thrilled that you were able to see those Flamenco dancers. My parents, sister and I caught a show in Seville also and loved it. I am so glad that you guys are having such an awesome time and taking advantage of your time here. Way to go!

Linkous said...

So gorgeous. Next picture I want to see Christa sporting some of those serious sideburns :)
Love you guys!

ps Ryn and Elle have been wearing those dresses literally EVERY day :) and they're so careful to hang them up in the closet (instead of throwing them in the dress up box with all the other outfits).

The Wigginton Family said...

I just got the BEST idea. You know that ward dance coming up? I think we should dress up like Flamenco dancers...sideburns and all. We'll totally win! And we'll make sure we hang out with Biggest Loser girl a bunch before then so we can have energy to dance all night! Yeah, I'm glad you're home!