Highlights

When I get back to the States in less than three weeks I will be busy.  Seeing family again, getting ready for college, traveling around Canada with friends, and also I'm still trying to figure out a way to make pokemon real, after all if video games and T.V have taught me anything (I get all my life lessons from them) the perfect world is one in which pets battle for the entertainment of ten-year-olds, and I'm almost twenty, I should be a master by now.  Unfortunately the world still frowns upon pokemon thanks in large part to jerks like Micheal Vick, you see pokemon is not about the innate violence in all of us or about making money, it's about picking out the snitches early before they have time to rat you out, pokemon is still a felony.  Thus, with my time here coming to an end, and my time in the U.S packed I'm going to try and recount some of the best times I had in Spain and what I'll remember most about this year.  *Note, there are some parts of this year that I will always remember in a PTSD, shell shock sort of way, I will not be recounting those moments, if you would like to hear about them just ask me, then I will curl up in a ball, clutch my knees, and whisper to myself.  You know what, it's probably better if you don't ask me, and I can just keep the emotions bottled up inside and grow a stress tumor, that's how men deal with emotions.

I will try to cover three subjects in this highlight reel, beach time, traveling, and meeting people.  I could cover other topics about times where I reasonably enjoyed myself, or had an average amount of enjoyment, but those times are not interesting.  It is similar to how it's going to be in the future when I have kids and go the the parent teacher meetings for Kindergarten, the teacher will say to all the other parents how their child is such a 'hard-worker' or 'shares really well' picking out one little point to advertise.  Then the teacher will take me aside away from the other parents and tell me about how my child is the best at fucking everything, he finger paints, then flows seamlessly into nap time, and has sharing skills that would put that other little kid to shame.  In fact the teacher was thinking about organizing a competition just to humiliate the other little brats compared to my child.  At least, that is better what the teacher tells me, otherwise my lazy-bastard of a child is going back to sleep in the basement.  Anyways, the only stories I'm going to tell are the ones that are as awesome as my theoretical child, the stories that beat all the others without even trying.
First up is the beach.  As I have mentioned before all the beaches in San Sebastian are nude beaches, or at least that is how they are treated by the locals.  As with everything there is both a plus side and a male genitalia side to this issue.  It turns out women taking their tops off makes more sense than I thought, I originally believed that the end goal was actually to tan the breast.  This was confusing for me, because I can never imagine a woman in an intimate situation (lets face it, tans are for impressing other people) and she takes off her bra, then her potential partner sees the strange triangle tan lines and shakes their head in disgust before walking away.  As it turns out hen women remove their tops they trying to get rid of the tan lines left by straps so that when they wear another bathing suit they don't have strange lines everywhere.  Also, boobs are great, so why not take them out?  On the other hand there is always a large number of the geriatric crowd, or as they should be known on the beaches, group saggy.  I have seen couples of seventy plus years, smoking cigarettes together as they walk the beach, respective organs dangerously close to leaving trails in the sand.  I am not a fan of sunbathing, so I find other activities at the beach.  Surf and breakdance/parkour are two subhighlights of this year.  I danced on the sand, as opposed to concrete, where landing on my back was not such a big deal (unless attractive girls were watching, then it was the end of the world).  However breakdance is something that one can do anywhere in the world, so I'm going to move off the beach.  I spent a couple hundred Euros getting thrown around by waves and partially drowning, and I also stood up from time to time.  Yes, as it turns out surfing can be pants-shittingly terrifying.  At the beginning of the year I had the double benefit of having an instructor and being treated to nice slow-breaking waves, sort of like a bunny hill.  But that was at the start of winter, now at the start of summer the waves tend to break more like the 'Classic' waves that rise up then fall creating a tube, which is great, if you are good enough to ride inside the tube.  I normally end up on top of the tubes and fall four to six feet into the water, which doesn't seem so bad, until one takes into consideration it is like jumping from a high dive into a wave pool with an undertow and a giant piece of fiberglass strapped to your leg.  But the two hours waiting in the water turn out to be worth it for the ten minutes you actually end up standing on the board.  Just like falling on my back one hundred times is made worth it by finally performing a front flip.  These are highlights because I could see myself improving.  Although after a year I'm pretty sure I enjoy snowboarding more than surfing but learning a new skill and making myself a better/more badass human being is something that always appeals to me.  I will continue to dance in the United States and maybe if I have the chance I'll surf on vacation now and again, but what is most important is that I can wear those rocking shirts and boardshorts without being labeled as a poser, now I get to be one of the pompous jerks that actually do what their shirts say.

This post is the first of a three part series.  After I finish the recounting the best parts of my exchange I will probably have finished with this blog.  As of today there are eighteen days remaining for my Rotary year before I head back to the states.  I might feel compelled to write a follow up post or two from the U.S, but if I kept this up too long it might just devolve into a blog about my life, and no one wants to hear that.  You might think I'm wrong, but if you go ahead and click to the next blog and just bump around this site for a while and read peoples stories about dogs tracking mud into the house or babies first steps.  Then try and rate how much you connect with the story against how much you just want to punch the person in the ovary for wasting your time.  Everyone else shares their stories with friends, in person, why would someone post their lives on the Internet?  An example would be how everyone in public restrooms poops in the stalls, doing their business with who they feel comfortable with, while a blogger would poop in the urinals because the whole world needs to know what shit is going on in their damn life even though it is probably no different from any one else's crap.  The next post will cover traveling.

One Month and Hard Drugs

The package will be transported to the United States in one month or less.  It comes with a garuntee of having all four limbs attached and no sever mental scarring, no other gaurantees, he's too damn crazy.  The 'Andrew' model has changed significantly in the eight month period for which it has been absent from the United States.  It has improved its writing skills, been programmed with two foreign languages, come to a greater understanding of itself, and nearly all shame has been deprogrammed to the point where the unit has little trouble making exaggerated compliments about itself in the third person. Also, what a douche.
If I could say the one aspect of myself that changed the most this year it is my sense of embarrassment or shame.  Before this year my idea of living without shame was a theory but this year I have grown accustomed to implamenting it.  I formerly was uncomfortable in a room full of people who knew one another and wanted no part of me, I tried to latch on to people and join part of a group but when they shot me down I tried to hide in a corner, or better yet, self destruct.  Now I have learned that if the people around me want to exclude me they can depart the scene and copulate themselves (Get lost and, well, you know), because I'm freakin awesome.  That's the stance one must take in certain situations.  Analize the situation, if you are doing nothing wrong (like being over-agressive, creepy, high/drunk, Italian, etc.) , and the strangers are unaware of your past police record, and they still chose to ignore you, then screw them!  If they don't want a chance to meet a new person than they don't deserve to know you, and as an added bonus for your imagination, if they're guys they most likely have small genitals at least in relation to a person as open as yourself.  I think that way because if the man does not want to meet me then he is clearly fearful of a situation where he gets to know a stranger and they end up in a sponaneous game of 'Drop Trousers and Compare.'  Also they have irrational fears and strange thought processes.
On the flip side of that situation, if you are feeling lonely don't be afraid to go out onto the street and talk with complete strangers.  Or maybe visit a cafe and offer to sit with someone who is alone.  Seriously.  Chances are some of them are bored and thinking exactly what you are, namely, 'Why don't interesting people just walk up to me and introduce myself, if they started a conversation I would be more than willing to talk with them.'  I have met a decent number of people that way, so don't be afraid that everyone but you is thinking that they are superior and avoiding you in particular on purpose. 
Another change in me is my aversion to drug users.  *Note: Not to be confused in a change of aversion to drugs, I still avoid those like fat kids avoid carrots.  Numbers of people here smoke cigarettes and although I don't care for the smell I've accepted it as just another habit that an individual will change if they want to or ask for help if they desire it.  Marijuana is widespread in Spain, if it is more available than in the U.S I'm not sure, but many people here smoke up from time to time.  Far from going crazy and blowing their brains out these people tended to laugh more and look ridiculous, I actually have found high people to be less dangerous to themselves and others than drunk people.  Although Rotary forbids drinking and drugs, when I'm out on the streets having a party with friends some people will be drunk and high, the drunk person is much more likely to try and get involved in a fight or threaten strangers or vomit all over my new god damn shoes.  Last drug related encounter, cocain.  Oh my God!  Cocain, Andrew why the fuck didn't you run in the opposite dirrection?!  In reality, because it's too common to be running away every time the drug shows up on the streets.  Random people standing on corners will nod at you and hold up a little baggie, or ask you if you're looking for something, and all you have to do is shake your head and walk past, and they will leave you alone.  However on one situation I came a little closer.  I ran into some Americans (and a British guy with a hilarious accent), on the streets and decided to link up with their group because it tends to be easy getting to know Americans than Basques.  We were walking along the boardwalk in front of the beach at about two in the morning when the group stopped.  I thought they were trying to figure out what to do next, turns out they already had that figured out, buy a powdery accelerant to snort up their noses.  My first reaction was to burn rubber and run away like the nearly six foot glob of wuss that I am, but a stronger urge was curiosity.  With my feet ready to haul me out of there if one of the coke-heads decided to go on a stabbing spree that coke-heads are known for, I held my ground.  There were two Americans in the group who tried to ignore the transaction entirely and seemed disappointed the others were buying coke so I was not overly afraid, these other two guys seemed like reasonable nerds, generally a safe group of people.  The group was negotiating quality, quantity, and price of the good, and I have to say they were some of the most empathetic and generous people I've ever seen conduct business.   The dealer provided the group with something called 'tasters' where a buyer wets his pinky finger and dunks it into a coke bag so they could then brush their teeth with the substance, three group members did this.  The Americans then circled up to discuss quality, and I have never heard a conversation that came so close to the picture I have in my head of a female, high school sleepover.  Everyone who had tried it said the quality was terrible, it tasted like baking soda apparently, but the one man felt so bad that they had taken so much in free 'tasters.'  Another argued that the dealer had given them large tasters so that they would feel bad and more likely to buy, and the origional responded by saying 'Well it worked, I don't feel right doing that to him,' in a tone like that of a girl having a fight with here BFF and looking to her other friends for advice.  While two went to buy the low quality drug another said to me and the rest of the group that they were getting a bad deal but they felt obligated to purchase.  The other men then returned and offered free rounds of coke to anyone who was interested, three of the five men then proceded to snort the contents of a little plastic bag.  Unlike my expectations none of them pulled a gun, and no one decided it would be a good idea to jump head first onto concrete.  Instead they just seemed jittery and zoned out at the same time which was a strange combination to see.  Thus I have learned to not completely write a person off do to drug use, they could be good people who have just made some mistakes.  After my morbid curiosity was satisfied by watching strangers take a potentially deadly stimulant I said goodbye and went on an adventure to search for females.
I will try to make a few more posts before I finish up the year, but I'm also going to try to have as much fun as possible.  After all, next year I'll be in college, and everyone know that no one has enjoys themselves at those institutions of higher learning, or at the very least they most likely won't be surfing.

Art

I am not a huge fan of art.  I find it boring and uninspired, or if not, lame it seems to be hack and unmotivated.  I'm always disappointed when I'm shown a famous piece that has been critically acclaimed and is worth tens of thousands of dollars and there is just a red square slightly off center.  Let me take a moment to clarify, I love almost every artist I know and I love their works, street artists do a fantastic job as well, cartoonists, surrealists, and graphic designers all turn out paintings, drawings, sketches, and strips I can appreciate.  I have a problem with 'art' as defined by the art community with power, that is curators, critics, and collectors.  The three C's love money but hate art and will do anything they can to destroy said industry.  They collect, swap, and bargain classic pieces to give them great value but never let a new name break onto the scene unless they create terrible blotches of paint on canvas.  Dali, Picasso, Monet, Da Vinchi, Van Gogh, O'Keeffe, Warhol, what are the two things they share?  First, they are the only artists a common man would know Second, they are dead.  If you want something to be valuable in the art world it better have one of their names on it (or some other popular dead person), otherwise no one will buy it.  Why not?  Because if art was valued based on style, originality, detail, and overall beauty then collectors and museums would suddenly lose a whole lot of money.  Also they are trying to destroy art because their hearts are suspected to be two sizes too small.  Note: I made all of that up, but it sounds pretty freakin logical am I right?  Anyways, I think if the starving artist types decided to take authority and take control of the community because those are the people who really love art.  They could find works that have vision and a creative artist behind them, re-work cliched museums, breath new life into worldwide interest in art, and maybe even make a little money.  Now I know some artists will be opposed to the making money part of my proposal, it might interrupt their whole starving lifestyle, but think of it like this: you could just give all the money away and leave yourself barely enough to scrape together for a bowl of Kraft Mac'n'cheese and a pack of cigarettes per week, just like you're accustomed to.  So I don't hate artists or most of what they create, I just hate what collectors have done to warp the idea of 'art' around some contrived concept that keeps them rich and feeling like they're better than everyone else.  So I say starving artists punch art collectors in their tiny hearts, with any luck they'll have a heart attack and die, we don't have time to help the Grinch in this story.

There seem to be only a few types of famous 'masterpieces' left in the world.  There are a few that I really appreciate, Dali and MC Escher being all of them.  I once thought that I enjoyed other artists but then I went to these horrible locations, formed of broken dreams and artistic constipation, called museums.  Besides the Surrealism that I actually enjoy there seem to be three main types of art, Classical, Modern, and Drug Induced.  I hate them all, and will explain why.  Classical art is all painted in the same style and the subject was either the bible or whatever royal family could get their kids to sit still long enough to have a portrait done.  Sometimes really crazy artists painted kings and queens with angels and Jesuses, combining the two themes to create something twice as boring.  I discovered this after visiting the Prado, one of Spain's most famous museums, all the pieces looks like the same guy painted them all in the exact same way.  That is when I stopped liking most artists, when I found out they were all copy cats.  It would be like if I was a writer and copied Stephen King's writing style down to a pin but then added in some M. Night Shamalan twist endings in.  There are those who would call me a good-for-nothing fraud, and then once my mother got done making fun of me the critics would be worse.  That's all I find in Classic art the same thing over and over, with a slight twist. 
Modern art is bullshit.
Drug Induced art has a potential to be decent, there might be some ideas partially visible, and maybe an overlaying theme or social commentary, but the person clearly took one too many pills before starting.  It does show more initiative than Modern art, which, as previously mentioned, is bullshit, but there is still a great lacking in true artistic presence.  A good example of Drug Induced art is Pablo 'drop the acid' Picasso.  As the nickname I hope catches on suggests, he liked him some hallucinations brought on by massive amounts of foreign chemicals in the blood stream.  He painted some good art at one point, people bought some of his paintings, he earned enough money to buy some really powerful drugs, painted some terrible and crappy art, people bought his paintings because he was already famous, and he got enough money to buy more drugs.  There is a lesson in his story people of the world.  If a friends shows you a piece of art clearly influenced by drugs that may have life threatening consequences, do NOT buy it to make them feel better.  They will think the art is good and think their inspiration came from the crazy acid trip.  If anything find out where they got the drugs and then buy some yourself, the drugs made that piece of crap your friend painted look like a masterpiece, it must be some good shit.

P.S  Starving artists, if you take my advice and renew real, beautiful, new, and creative art please don't use the money like Picasso did.  Don't do hard drugs if your in a position of power, you'll just end up ruining art for everyone all over again.  There is plenty of time for hard drugs when your retired, besides the nursing home could use some people who live it up.

Football aka Soccer

I love professional sports.  Or I should say, I love parties based around professional sports with a mild interest about what is happening on the T.V.  Pizza, spicy wings, cheerleaders, one dollar pride bets, cheerleaders.  The only way sports could be any better is if they were something I was actually interested in following, like the Governator (when he was in his youth) fighting Mongals and the Zerg in the Colosseum, which I would totally pay to see.  There are competitions I would love to watch: sword fighting, parkor, video games, and stand-up comedy are great fun for me to watch, except for there are neither cheerleaders nor hot wings.  Statistics of a study I just made up say that men interested in those activities are 1/3 less likely to win the girl at the end of the romantic comedy than their helmet wearing, quarter-back tackling peers.  So when I was asked if I would like to attend a Futbol (yeah, they actually spell it that way) match I was conflicted.  In the end I remembered what Rotary had taught me to accept any offer to meet new people, so I headed off with my host brother to watch San Sebastian's team play some other team.  I was assured by all of the Basque people that the other team was totally lame.  We went to a bar, ordered red bulls for some reason, and sat down to enjoy a fierce human competition of... what is, sure to... be, ugh, I'm already bored.  I sat through the full ninety minutes of game plus the half time review of whatever was happening in the game then the next morning everyone was talking about the game, but I can't even remember who won, the only fact that sticks in my mind was that there were no hot wings.  In fact there was no food at all, there weren't even cheerleaders to help direct blood away from our cramped stomachs. 
Oh well, that was just one evening, I figure I should give Futbol a second chance to prove itself, after all it's the national sport of Everywhere that's Not the United States.  I did in fact attend a second soccer game, this time in person.  I went to see my host brother and some friends play in a high school match.  Since we were in person I was hoping for some Spanish sports food to be passed around the stands, like cheese nachos.  Instead I had a conversation with the people around me about how Americans are so fat they're always eating something at sports matches.  I could see their point, one can get distracted from the match when they're trying to not drop ketchup on their pants, the Spanish don't have this problem, smoking cigarettes assures zero percent spillage onto clothing, they're light years ahead of us.  During the game I learned some of the fundamentals of soccer and why it will fall into the category in which I hold most other sports, meh.

Here are some key facts I understand:  You want to put the ball in the goal, if you put the ball in the goal enough you earn millions of dollars and get to date supermodels, and intelligence/speaking skills not required.  I used to enjoy playing rec league soccer, rec meaning recreation, which means everyone wins.  I enjoyed this set up, we could still be competitive if we wanted to, but there was no need to beat the shit out of anyone over a win or a loss.  Unless you were a parent, because your neighbor's bastard kid was ruining your childstar's chances at reaching the Olympics and forever redeeming your wasted life.  With enough reinforcement kids start to believe that they are indeed superior to their peers and then they can scream and curse all by themselves (they grow up so fast).  For example I would not say that a sports match is a reason for killing another human being.  There are some people who would politely disagree with me, right before shanking me in the stomach, putting a Real Madrid Jersey (soccer team) on my corpse, and calling the cops, the police would plant a suicide note on my body and everyone would understand why a person who liked that team would off themselves after Madrid played Barcelona. 

Madrid and Barcelona are the two biggest teams in Spain (also they are cities but no one seems to care about that fact) and this year they have played five times.  Every time they played, for days afterwards, every conversation is dominated by what calls were unfair and who really should have won or why the team that won deserved it.  Every XY chromosome has some sort of input to add just like in the United States.  Something about Spain (or maybe just my region), there seem to be no competetive female sports on any level.  I have no idea why and I'll be honest about something here, I miss strong females.  One favorite past time of the Basque people is screaming at T.V screens and the starting fist fights in real life because of what happened on said screen.  Out of all the problems that affect the game one of the worst is the refusal of referees to use instant replays.  It would be like working on a math problem then not double checking with a calculator, sure the technology is there but where is the excitement of a stranger showing up at your house to break your knees after their building collapses to faulty engineering.  Actually for causing a building to collapse you would probably just get fired, but if you fuck up a Futbol call you better start wearing shin guards and and a cup year round, because the fans are coming for you.  And they're pissed.

All in all I can't wait to get back to the U.S and have a Superbowl party and some March Madness parties.  Who knows, I might even watch some sports.