Language goof-ups

Okay, one of the suggestions I received on how to improve my blog postings was to write about language goof-ups. This isn't really embarrassing, but it was a little humbling. When I was at the airport recently to pick up some of our visitors, we went to Pans & Company so they could grab a quick sandwich before we headed out to see the sights. I was trying to help--yeah, right. And I told the lady behind the counter that the order was "para ir" which would be like saying "to go" in the States. She said "What?" (only in Spanish) and I repeated myself. She asked me to repeat myself one more time and then the guy in the next line over said to her "para llevar" which means "to take." So I learned something new at the airport. Obviously I don't order fast food too much over here or I probably would have known that already. Oh well, live and learn, right?

More Guests

We had more visitors from the States this past week. We took them to see various places in Barcelona the day they arrived. This picture was taken at the castle on top of Montjuic.


The next day, some of us went to Montserrat. This photo was taken in front of the church that is part of the monastery there.


Then on the third day, we all drove down to Tarragona to see the sites there before we dropped them off at the airport at the end of the day. Here we are in front of the aqueduct just outside the city.
This aqueduct is not as impressive as the one in Segovia, but you can walk across it. I took this photo of everyone sitting on the top.
We even found a place that sells gelato (Italian ice cream) and enjoyed it while overlooking the Mediterranean. It was a lovely day.We enjoyed having them, but the time went by much too quickly. Our doors are open if you want to visit and we would be glad to show you around too!

La Diada de Sant Jordi

La Diada de Sant Jordi (St. George's Day), also known as el dia de la rosa (The Day of the Rose) or el dia del llibre (The Day of the Book).

St. George is the patron saint of Catalonia. His day is celebrated on April 23rd and this has been Catalonia’s own Valentine’s Day since the Middle Ages. That was when St. George slew the dragon, saved the princess and plucked a rose from a rose bush that had conveniently sprouted up from the dragon's red blood, so that George could gallantly give his true love a red, red rose.

Roses have been associated with this day since medieval times, but the giving of books is a more recent tradition. In 1923, a bookseller started to promote the holiday as a way to honour the nearly simultaneous deaths of Miguel Cervantes and William Shakespeare. Barcelona is the publishing capital in both Catalan and Spanish and this heady one-two punch of love and literacy was quickly adopted.

On Barcelona's most visited street, La Rambla, and all over Catalonia, thousands of stands of roses and makeshift bookstalls are hastily set up for the occasion. By the end of the day, some four million roses and 400,000 books would have been purchased in the name of love. You will be hard-pressed to find a woman without a rose in hand, and half of the total yearly book sales in Catalonia take place on this occasion.

(Most of this information was gotten from Wikipedia.)

I need your help

For the few of you that actually read this blog, you're probably more than aware that I'm not very good at this blogging thing. I realized part of the problem is that I struggle with what kinds of things would be interesting to people. So I would like for you to post a comment to this blog, or send me an email if you'd rather, and let me know what kinds of things you would like to see here. Thanks in advance for your help!

Visitors

We had friends from the States come to visit the first week of April. Kathy and I had fun showing them Barcelona, Montserrat and Tossa de Mar. Jon stayed at home and worked so we could play. I drove them to Zaragoza for an overnight visit to some other co-workers where we also saw some sights. We had a great time. I just hope we didn't wear them out.

This past weekend we hosted the women of our mission team here in Spain. We spent a lot of time sharing with, and praying for, one another. We also saw some sights in Barcelona. It was a great time of being together, something we don't get to do very often because we work all over the country and most of us are about 4-5 hours from the closest teammate.

I always enjoy these visits from State-side friends and our teammates here in Spain. They refresh my soul and give me encouragement to continue my work here.