I don't know if that was appropriate, but I just did it.

Oh Feria. 

Any other words need apply? NOPE!

For those of you who don't know what Feria is, let me do a little explaining so the rest of this post will go down a little smoother. Feria is a festival/carnival that happens every spring in Sevilla, usually two weeks after Holy Week. It's started out in the mid 1800's as an agricultural fair, but it's since evolved into a crazy drinking, eating and dancing fest. It takes place in a neighborhood by the river, like a fairground. The catch is that there are tents, or "casetas" everywhere. Well, they're not actually tents, they're more like miniature houses, complete with kitchens, bars, bathrooms and dancefloors. There are only a few public casetas, but otherwise they are each owned by private families, businesses, clubs, etc. You can only get into a private caseta by invitacion from the owner. 

Typically all you do is eat and drink once you get there. The drink of choice during Feria is Rebujito - a mixture of sherry and sprite. It's very light and refreshing, served extremely cold... but don't be fooled, it sneaks up on you! As far as food goes, you can order just about any kind of tapas. My favorites include tortilla espanola (egg and potato quiche type dish), croquettas, queso manchego y jamon serrano (special hard cheese and cured ham) and gambas (shrimp). As tapas, you just pick at the little portions in between sips of rebujito, and then keep ordering when you're out! The party officially goes from midnight on Tuesday to midnight the following Sunday. The whole city is basically shut down because everyone lives at Feria from about 10 in the morning to the weeeeee hours of the night. 

Another little tidbit that makes it so fun: all the men wear suits and the woman wear traditional Flamenco dresses, complete with peinetas (massice hair combs), flowers and earring with such size that they could weigh down an iron man. Each dress is different - there were so many patterns, colors and styles that I literally couldn't pick a favorite!

Thursday night was my first Feria experience. Our house mother, who we call Big Mama, invited us to meet her at the Portada (main gate, which is specially decorated each year) at 10 to go to her friend's caseta.



When we got there, there were just hundreds of people in every direction. I was amazed. Ana finally found us and took us hand in hand and walked us through the grounds to the caseta. She immediately bought us some mazanilla (the sherry) and a bunch of tapas.



We met a few of her friends and their families and then sat around and watched everyone dance the Sevillana - a folk version of Flamenco that is special to Sevilla and the Feria.



SO MUCH FUN! We took the bus home and got in around 1:30 or so. 

The next afternoon Liz and I went to Feria during the day just to check it out. There were still so many people... and during the day they have about a million horse-drawn carriages riding through the streets. It was pretty crowded, so we just walked around all the casetas and onto the Calle del Infierno (Street of Hell) where all the rides and games are... and where the children go crazy. We bought ice cream cones and then got out of there pretty fast. 

The next day, we got ready to go to the Feria with our house mom and sister, Ana. We were under the impression that we were just going to go have lunch and hang out for a bit, then come home... but boy were we wrong. We left the house around noon on Saturday and got to the grounds by 12:30. We went right into the first caseta and had lots of tapas and rebujito. Big Mama's friend Mara Louisa showed up and she was great right from the start - looked and acted just like the short and funny friend of Meryl Streep from Mamma Mia! Anyways, we hung out at that caseta for about two hours, then moved onto the next caseta. There, we polished off three pitchers of rebujto and some more food, I made eyes at one of the waitors, and then we headed off to Maria Louisa's caseta after about an hour.



Maria Louisa's caseta was HUGE - owned by the architect she works for. We sat down at a corner table and immediately our house mom ordered more rebujito. And food. And more rebujito. And more food. Then she just decided to forget mixing the sherry and started polishing off straight manzanilla. They went to dance the Sevillana and spent quite a bit of time on the dance floor... even convinced Liz and I to come out after a while. But we're not really going to talk about that...

After I realized I was tired, I looked at the clock and realized it was almost 9:00. We had been at it since noon. No one else was ready to go home though, so I went to the bar and got a Coca-light - at which point my house sister looks at me and in plain English says "Coca-light? You are so boring!" Liz and I couldn't believe it! That little twat was holding out on us - she could speak English this whole time! I just thought that was the best thing in the world, so I decided to get back in the game and quick. Instead of sipping on the rebujito, I started taking the little glasses like shots and that got everyone on the wagon. Ana and Maria Louisa were smoking like chimneys, Big Mama was just laughing and slurring her words, knocking glasses over about every 10 minutes... oblivious to how much she had had to drink. At one point the waiter came over to clear our table but he couldn't reach all the way down, so he asked me to move, but I just grabbed the rag from his hand and started cleaning the table myself. This made everyone double over in laughter... but I just wanted to help. Later on I made friends with that waiter in the line for the bathroom and he was really friendly the rest of the night. 

After a while, Ana's best friend Jema showed up and she was just great. Our table in the corner straight up turned into a legit party - independent of Feria festivities - and we just laughed the night away. Around midnight, Big Mama and Maria Louisa were like 17000 sheets to the wind, so they decided to call it a night, but Liz and I went to another caseta with Ana and Jema. There, we got to meet Jema's parents. Her mom, Loli, was probably the nicest Spaniard I've ever met. Straight up sweetheart - and that's nearly impossible if you live in this country, so imagine my surprise and relief! Loli bought us all sorts of tapas and cokes, rebujito too. Then Jema's friends Nacho and Jose showed up and started talking to us. At this point in time, I had a huge breakthrough...

For the first time in my life I had a personality in Spanish. This is something I'm always very concerned about... because although I know how to communicate effectively, I don't really know how to express myself. Something happened right there and then in that caseta though, because I was myself for the first time ever. Cracking jokes. Making puns. Telling stories. I was speaking so fast - I wasn't making errors - I understood everything the natives were saying too me. I don't know what clicked, but it was amazing. At one point in time, I was telling a joke and evvvvvveryone was laughing, like falling out of their chairs laughing -- not because I was a silly American who didn't know what she was doing, but because I GOT DOWN! After I spoke a little slang that I learned in my semantics class, they told me that I had really become a Sevillana... which is a HUGE complement... even if it wasn't totally true :)  When they said that I got so excited that I knocked a few wine glasses onto the floor, and when they broke I screamed "OLE!" And everyone clapped. Thank God for this curious string of events, at the time when I most needed it. 

By this point in the night, it was about 3:00 and Ana was about ready to pass out. She and Jema left to go home, but Liz and I stayed with Nacho and Jose to hang out. We walked around Feria, danced a little Sevillana and then ended up going to a cafe where they sold churros with hot chocolate.



We sat around and joked for a while, then the guys took us to the metro so we could go home. We rolled up to the front door around 5:15... Liz went upstairs to sleep, but I decided to hangout with the boys a little more. We took the  metro all the way out to Dos Hermanas, an outskirts pueblo of Sevilla. Then Jose got his car and drove us out into the country to watch the sunrise. We just sat around and talked for a few hours, but it was so pleasant. He drove me back to Sevilla but I didn't walk through the door until 9:30 Sunday morning. That means 22.5 hours of straight partying. Take that. 

I was afraid Big Mama would be awake and waiting, ready to scold me for not coming home. But when I walked in the house was a mess... I guess she kept the party going when she got home hahahaha. I tip-toed to my door, but when I grabbed the handle I heard a huge heaving moan from Big Mama's room... she was throwing up. Oh Hangovers. They get the best of us sometime. I hopped in the shower to wash the fiesta remnants away, then climbed into bed around 10. We have a literal iron curtain outside our window, so we lowered that to block the sun out and slept until 3:00 that afternoon. We woke up and our house brother Julio just laughed at us as he made us lunch. 

I had a wonderful time and really bonded with Liz, Ana and Big Mama. We've all been very giggly this week since Feria, and things are finally reaching the point of perfection at the very end of this experience. Yesterday, Julio even taught us how to make tortilla - it's my FAVORITE, and he is the master!!!! It's quite the intricate process, and it's really intimidating because of all the flipping you have to do.



However, our maiden voyage on the tortilla was a success! We ate every bite for dinner last night, and then tonight we made our own with no help.



I'm already coming up with tons of ideas for toppings and variations so I can share the glory that is tortilla espanola with you all when I get home!!

This week is the last of classes. Friday we're going to a national park and the beach, maybe a futbol match on Saturday. Other than that it's studying for finals and packing... only 11 days until bye bye Spain and hello UK!