la noche...

We started the evening off with a little cultural enrichment—our friend Xandra’s mother, Pilar, invited us to attend a play at the Teatro Alhambra in Realejo the star of which was a long time family friend from Madrid. A two person production entitled, “Arizona” it was all in Spanish obviously but surprisingly easy to understand. We of course knew nothing of the premise, as Pilar had only told us that it had very important themes and provocative messages—provacative indeed. I really do not have the words to describe it, it was simply written, set in the desert in Arizona where an American husband and wife set up camp to defend the US/Mexico border
“JUAN CARLOS RUBIO EXPLORA EL DOGMATISMO Y LA IRRACIONALIDAD DE LA INTOLERANCIA Y EL RACISMO A TRAVÉS DE DOS PERSONAJES QUE VAN ARQUETÍPICOS DE “CACERÍA” EN ARIZONA”
Basically the play explores the nature racism, xenophobia, and intolerance highlighting the irrationality of such fears. Suffice it say, without going into too much detail, there is a rape scene (nothing graphic but not expected) followed by the murder-suicide of the protagonists….obviously we had to go out for tapas after….
Pilar and Xandra were embarrassed that the play had been so openly critical of Americans and continuously reminded us that the themes could be applied universally. I was not offended at all, in fact I thought it was great theater and was very amused when the two characters spontaneously broke into song about defending the border from foreigners who want to rape and pillage our country. This was further reinforced when the lead in the play met us for a drink and apologized again and tried to explain the universality of the play. I wasn’t bothered at all and was more impressed that we were hanging out with the lead actor than anything else.
After some delicious tapas of all house cured meats, salchichons, pates, cheese and of course glorious olives (my love of olives is now solidified—I have converted and its impossible for me to tomo el vino tinto sin olivas) we went to a bar to dance. Ying, I just want to shout out a personal thank you to you, because I busted out my zumba moves like you wouldn’t believe. And we had a blast. Am still struggling with the smoking indoors and ashing on the floor (apparently you can also smoke pot in bars because EVERYone was doin it), but other than that the evening was a smashing success. The venue was a spot for “typical” Granada music which it seems to me is a blend of salsa, flamenco and any other sort of latin American rhythms (thus the zumba). Tried to explain what zumba is but obviously it doesn’t really exist here, probably because for them dancing the zumba is just another Saturday night. Didn’t make it home until late but it was worth it! Am looking forward to perfecting my moves and learning more, I love to shake it, and damn can those Spanish girls dance!