Nerja--love and hate

So I’m writing this as we head back from Nerja, Spain, which is located in Andalucia. To start off by describing this place I’d have to say imagine clear blue waters, palm trees, bright sun, a calm and tranquil feeling that seems to permeate not only the air but the people as well. The buildings look older as if you stepped into an old part of New Orleans before Katrina and the air smells of ocean, salt, and depending where you are, pizza. The people here are beautiful, tan, and don’t have much of a rush to get anywhere. Nerja, in one word, is paradise.

We arrived early on Saturday morning after an interesting trip from Madrid where we encountered an old hippy stoner, aged 70, from the states who we named “Bill.” He told us nearly his entire life story and we found that wonderful and quite humorous as we waited the three hours for our bus in Madrid. Finally, after nearly an hour-long conversation that consisted mostly of Bill telling us about how he had travelled nearly the entire world and finally settled in Spain about six years ago, we were off. The bus ride was mild and we slept enough to get by. We switched buses in Cordoba and then we were off to Nerja. Now understand that Nerja is surrounded by mountains so as Alex Miller said, it looks much like Maui, Hawaii.

Saturday morning, Alex M. and I watched the sunrise come up over the mountains and it was quite beautiful in the south of Spain. We arrived at Nerja around nine in the morning, found our supposed hostel, then later found out that we were staying and paying at another hostel, and headed off to the promised one. We arrived, were greeted by the owner who told us that the room was ready to go and that there were four beds. First thing that I noticed was no kitchen and no fridge, which meant no cold booze. Okay, so a small setback in a long and wonderful weekend that was guaranteed to make us relax before our last week in Spain. First thing was first—we slept for about three hours—woke up—and headed straight toward the beach. Now oddly enough, the weather in Nerja on Saturday was cloudy but that didn’t stop us—we ate some sandwiches we bought at a sandwich shop from a girl who we named “Sexy-Sandwich-Girl” and went straight to the beach, ate our sandwiches, and went swimming in the Mediterranean Sea for the second time in our lives. It was refreshing and chilly and felt great in contrast to the high temp and humidity. We tried to bake on the beach but with all of the cloud cover we didn’t get much sun. After that, we returned, showered, and went to the supermarket to buy a bottle of Bacardi, coke, orange Fanta, and ice. We also picked up some munchies and breakfast for the next morning. We iced down the drinks and headed out to complete a homework assignment that had been ungraciously bestowed upon us right before we left. We found the boys some potential culprits and then found out that we’d have to wait until about 10:30 that evening to talk with them but that they’d come back and charlar (chat). So, the boys feeling more relieved that they’d found native speakers (mostly) to talk to, we went out, bought pizzas—chowed down—and met back up with our newfound friends. The boys chatted with them, recorded the conversations and I scored a couple of pictures of the full moon and live crowd that filled the plaza. When they were done, we returned to the room, dropped off everything, mixed up some cuba libres (rum and coke) and headed down to the beach. Once there, we sat on some rocks on the beach, enjoying the view, smoking cigars that we had purchased earlier for celebration, and spent nearly 45 minutes just looking out over the sea and talking about how wonderful of a trip it had been. Finishing up our drinks I suggested that we go swimming because I had sweated and despite it being night, it was still quite warm, so we went back to the room, changed, and went night swimming underneath a full moon. I have to say that it was the best idea of the night because it was just so peaceful and beautiful. We were happy, laughing, and just having a wonderful time. It was probably the highlight of our trip and of the weekend and I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Back at the room we all decided to crash for the evening and slept until nearly noon. We woke up, ate some food we had purchased the night before, realized that all of the ice had melted, and headed off to the beach for another day of fun in the sun. Sunday decided to be sunny and hot, which truly fit the stereotypical Nerja-scene, and so we dipped in the sea three or four times between sun baking and girl gazing. Not exactly sure when our checkout time was, we thought we’d just leave our stuff in the room because the owner had told us she’d be gone all day—thinking we’d take advantage of that we just left our stuff, deciding we could return, shower, and leave without any harm or damage. Back at the room there was a note on the door that told us that we needed to call a certain number so as to reclaim our baggage. Okay, so maybe we should have taken our bags with us, but the lady never told us when checkout was, so we went up to her apartment and she told us that we had overstayed our visit and that she had to give some potential room renters another room or send them to another hostel because our stuff was in there. She then told us if we wanted our stuff we’d have to pay for the room for that day that day as well. Thinking that was fair, I asked her how much it was going to be, and in a matter-of-fact tone told me that it was sixty Euros once again. And we weren’t even going to stay the night! I agreed, of course, taking the blame that we had misunderstood, we paid the lady, and headed back to the room to wait for our bus, which was going to leave at 9:45 in the evening. So we had 7 hours of room use for 60€. Great. Back in the room we all expressed our anxiety, disappointment, and most of all, anger in various manners. I told the boys to shower and that we’d figure it out. Unfortunately, paying the owner another 20€ apiece left me with 40€ for the rest of my trip—therefore ruining any potential souvenirs I was going to buy for anyone else. You see, it’s 6.73€ for a ticket to Madrid from Segovia and vice-versa. Well, Doing the math, that 13.46€ out of my 40€ which leaves me with 26.54€. Plus, I needed a new pair of shorts because I found a hole in my only pair—thankfully I had seen a pair for 6€ down outside of our hostel. So that now leaves me with 20€--which I’m not even sure will pay for an extra bag on the plane ride back home, which means that I’ll have be carrying two carry-ons, which is a bitch if you’ve ever done it—especially since I’ll have to load my carry-ons with a bunch of stuff because there’s a fifty pound weight limit per bag.

Now after I had done all of this math, realizing that I’d just given a woman one-third of the rest of my money for a seven hour room stay, didn’t put me in a very good mood. In fact, despite the fact that our trip to paradise had been unmarred, paradise quickly became hellish. I was miserable and depressed and didn’t want to talk to anyone. All I wanted to do was get my money back so that I could at least get my friends a couple of souvenirs from the country that I told them I’d get them something from. Unfortunately that is now impossible because of some cunty-bitch who apparently has no sense of manners and can’t understand that even though she didn’t tell us that we needed to leave by noon, we should have. Sorry Miss Uppity-Bitch, but the last time I checked, I couldn’t read minds.

Well, needless to say, I was quite pissed for quite a long time. The boys tried their best to cheer me up, but I wasn’t going to have it. If there is anything in this world that makes me upset, it’s money. It’s the only thing that there is never enough of yet it constantly needs to be used. I don’t come from money, nor was I able to work this summer because instead of doing that, I decided that graduating from college a semester early was much more important and would save much more money than any type of money I’d ever make waiting at Bob Evans part-time with a shitty boss who favors some half-ass worker over someone who is true need. Forgive me for wanting to better myself and my career rather than work this summer, I think that the money I make in the future because of the networking and experiences that I’ve had will pay off much more than some stupid nowheresville job like that of Bob Evans. (No offense to anyone who makes a living there—it’s just not for me).

I spent most of the remaining time plotting revenge, trying to forgive, fighting back the desire to jump off the cliffs and onto the rocks, and many other various forms of death, murder, and forgiveness. I finally lightened up when we started people watching (and by people watching, I really mean scanning the beaches for topless chicks). The day didn’t improve and nothing magically got better, but my mood did. A billion Euros didn’t fall out of the sky either to compensate me for having such a helluva time with Miss Teutonic Twat Thief. However, I still had my toros and we had some “How I Met Your Mother” to watch when we got back to the room. We watched, laughed, and minorly bitched about how the money issue sucked, but we’d get through. (Well, they’ll do okay, but I’m a broke mofo still).

Finally, time to leave, I told the boys to go down and wait for me, I’d drop the key off and try and talk to the landlord louse once more. She answered the door, with the key in my hand, I gave it to her and she apologized once again for the misunderstanding—but I felt as if it were empty. I once again said that there was an obvious miscomprehension between the two of us. She then rambled about how it was just common knowledge and assumption that check-out was at noon. A huge surge of anger rose up in me and I just wanted to scream at her that she very well ruined Nerja for me, that she was a bitch, a thief, and a lying puta that needed to go and self-fornicate in a dark corner. Of course, like a decent Christian, I simply pushed the anger back down, and said that assumptions were for fools—and left without another word. I then bought those shorts that I needed and we headed toward the bus station.

I got a text message from my friend Casey Ostermeyer who told me she was moving out today and that she had all this extra stuff including a desk and computer chair she’d leave for me. I replied that that would be swell—snapped a few last pictures of “paradise” and was off toward Madrid.

Am I happy yet? By a long shot—not at all. I’ve had nothing but bad experiences with the people of this country. They’re rude and quite selfish. I’m coming to truly dislike Spaniards, who I originally thought were quite outstanding people, but this year has shown me another side of them. Perhaps this is all attributed to knowing more about their culture, understanding their language more this time around, or a various amount of other reasons. Whatever the case, matters to me not, what is quite apparent is that this country is quite lacking in first off, manners, second, selflessness, and thirdly, personal hygiene including but not limited to deodorant use. The latter is less important as the first two.

Now a small letter to the woman who owned the hostel.

Dear Miss Uppity Bitch-Thief,

First off, I’d like to say that your rooms are beautiful. They are quite lacking in scenery, but rather comfortable and clean. Despite not having a kitchen, I felt quite comfortable in your room. Thank you for promptly greeting us in the beginning, I appreciate that.

I do believe, however, that you have quite ruined Nerja for me. I always knew people like you existed in this world, but I always crossed my fingers that I’d never run across them—as luck would have it, which I don’t even believe in, you would cross my path and quite utterly cripple the outstanding view of what I thought I had of Spaniards and of Spain. Thank you for showing me the truth. When I came to the room and found that you had removed all of our possession for ransom of 60€ for a mere six hours because one your potential tenants couldn’t stay in there and you might possibly lose money for one god-forsaken night, I was utterly pissed. Don’t you know how to be selfless? I thought that this country was a country founded upon religion and a belief in some sort of higher power? I never knew that high powers had an ego and greed complex. Thank you for also shedding light upon that. I’d like to say that you are a cunty-bitch-whore who deserves nothing other than a slap in the face and a taste of your own medicine. Unfrotunately, I’m too much of a man to ever consider striking a woman, save if she is a ninja assassin after me. However, I am not above telling people how things are and you are lucky that I thought it would be best that I hold my tongue because it’s what Jesus would do. I hope that you know that there’s a special place reserved for people like you who take advantage of those who aren’t in totally accord and understanding with you—I believe that place is called Hell—and I hope that you enjoy an eternity in it, you lying fiend. As well, I hope that one day you realize the error of your foul and pretentious ways because your actions sure as hell aren’t going to save you—pray that God can. I hope that the money we gave you brings you happiness as it could have with my friends, you thief. As well, I hope that you don’t come to an unfortunately quick ending, however I’ll be looking forward to it and plan to subscribe to the local newspaper just to read your obituary about how the whore who stole from me met an untimely demise in a mixture of shark teeth, arsenic, and old lace.

Consider this mild,

N.D.

Of course, I’ll never send that to her and do I mean most of it? Maybe. I don’t get mad often and once I’m back in the states, things will be better. My friends will laugh at the fact that I wrote a very cynical and threatening theoretical letter to the owner of the hostel I stayed at in Nerja. They will of course forgive me for coming back empty-handed and we shall relive my memories in Spain instead. Life will be better once I’m out of the most selfish CoUNTry in all of the world because at least in the United States, people are a bit more gracious, understanding, and less-selfish (Surprisingly).

I have four days left of class, one project to complete, some more god-forsaken homework that will no doubt hinder my seeing of Segovia because I’ll be too busy working on it to go out—not that it matters now as I have 0 spending money left thanks to Nerja-Dueña-Pendeja. Oh well, at least I’ve got my good buddies Alex C. and Alex M. We’re going to make the most of this week and hopefully contact ETA with the whereabouts of a very potential next target in Nerja.

That’s all for now!