Welcome back to The Lost Stories of Spain! If you’re getting sick of those, invent a time machine, go back in time, and twist Past Me’s arm into being more active on the blog.

Anywho, let’s get right into the stories!

Monte Naranco

When I first moved to Grand Rapids, one of the biggest differences was the terrain. Most of Detroit, and especially the area I live in, is as flat as a board, so seeing these weird rises in the ground the locals called “hills” was something to get used to.

Oviedo not only had lots of hills, but the town was something like a bowl. Anywhere in the city, I could look off into the horizon and see houses up in the mountains, as well as a statue of Jesus.

The statue was on top of the Monte Naranco. Benji and Tanner had climbed it, and wanted to make a second trip. I went with the two of them, along with Elizabeth. The walk up was steep, but mostly uneventful…unfortunately? Tanner and Benji had said they’d seen some wild stuff on their first trek. A wild boar had come out of the woods while they were on a footpath, and at somewhere close to the top, they found some kind of a cave that looked like it had been (or was still) occupied. The most eventful thing that happened on the way up was us finding some kind of slug on one of the paths:

Once we got to the top, we took it all in. I snapped the infamous selfie with Jesus

And that’s about it. Anticlimactic, innit? I did whip and nae-nae to the sound of a sheep bleating on the way down, so that’s something.

Iratxe’s Birthday Video

I don’t think I’ve talked about Spanish Netflix yet. It is great. I watched Avatar: The Last Airbender all the way through in Spain. There was a lot of other stuff not available in America, but I didn’t get around to them.

I [might have] been bathing in the glory of Spanish Netflix and looked up from my iPad. José was standing in the doorway of his bedroom, wearing a big New Year’s hat.

This was in October, mind you, two weeks before Halloween and two months before New Year’s. I decided Spanish Netflix (or YouTube; it could have been either) could wait and walked to the living room. I found Elisa and Hugo, their grandson, similarly dressed up. I asked what was going on. Iratxe (e-RA-chay), Hugo’s mother, was celebrating her birthday, and they wanted to send a video.

Being a good host son, I volunteered to be a cameraman. We got it after a few takes, and it was sent to Iratxe.

You ever had one of those moments where you see something so bizarre that your first impulse is to wonder whether you might have unknowingly huffed something? I used to call them “Art Teacher Pushing Himself to the Lunchroom on a Rolling Chair with a Hockey Stick” moments. (Don’t ask.) Now I call it “Host Dad Walking by My Room Wearing a New Year’s Hat in the Middle of October” moments.

Little less of a mouthful.

The Great Blunder

There had been a buzz for a few days prior to this story. King Felipe and Queen Letizia were going to be visiting Oviedo’s Teatro Campoamor. I had been talking with some people about going to see them arrive.

Well, on October 19, the day of, I got a message from Cameron saying he was with a group and that they were waiting on the King and Queen’s arrival.

I was up, explaining what was going on to José and Elisa, and sprinting for the place in about two minutes. This was an instance of God’s good will; I had no red lights on the way, and I managed to keep a good pace, despite a good chunk of the run being uphill. I ended up on the wrong side of the street, but got to where I wanted to be without getting jumped by Spanish police.

I found Tanner, Elizabeth, Elise and Benji waiting for the King and Queen’s arrival. I also bumped into Ivana, one of my classmates who was from South Korea, as well as Ally and Madison, two of my classmates who were from Boston.

Tanner had found some kind of program for the event, which he eventually passed to me. I opened it and was immediately drawn to one name: Martin Scorsese.

That’s right, Martin Scorsese was going to be attending this event.

My mind immediately went to Max. While trying to get a picture with Martin Scorsese was out of the question, getting a picture of Martin Scorsese to send Max was a done deal.

Or that’s what I was thinking until I looked up from the brochure. As if on cue, a car rolled up, and Martin Scorsese stepped from the car.

And me without my camera cued up.

Things to know about Martin Scorsese: 1. The man is a cinematic genius. We’re talking about the guy behind masterpieces like Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Goodfellas, and The Departed. 2. The guy has as much reverence for the big screen as he has garnered behind the camera. He’s big into film preservation and old movies, hence the presumable reason he was going out for a night at the theater in Spain. 3. The guy is super-short. Like, I’d be surprised if he broke 5’4″. That last fact came back to bite me; a short Italian-American man among the beefcakes the King and Queen had for security meant he got out of his car and disappeared into the crowd by the time I had my camera out.

There is something of a happy ending to this story. After the crowd started to disperse, I ran into Cameron chatting with Ally and Madison. He had been telling them about Guinness, and they were down for some Irish ale. So the four of us hung out at Guinness for a bit.

Sorry, Max. I’ll get around to watching Goodfellas someday.

The Logic Look-Alike

While we were riding back from the Picos de Europas, Kassidy, Kennedy, Maddie and Meghan were talking about going out that night. I already mentioned this, but the four of them were hardcore travel buddies. The four of them (or three of them, occasionally) hit Paris, Dublin, the Basque city of Bilbao, and Portugal, and that’s just the places I can remember off the top of my head. Seeing as this was a chance to hang out with them that didn’t involve paying for a plane ticket or a hotel, I texted Kassidy when I got home asking if I could join them. I got the yes from her and a time and place to meet them. At 11, I put on my best night wear (read: a Punisher graphic tee and a hoodie) bid an “hasta luego” to my host parents, and walked over to Jamón y Jamón, the restaurant I was supposed to meet the girls at.

I found them, and also found out that Spanish people really like eating ham dishes at midnight. The place was packed, and after a few drinks, we decided to peace out. We walked downhill and found ourselves in a bar. I went inside with the girls, then walked back outside when they started ordering drinks. As I stood outside waiting for them to come out with their drinks, I noticed a guy sitting by one of the bar’s windows. Wow, I thought. That dude looks exactly like Logic.

Kassidy was the first one out of the bar, and when she joined me, I pointed the guy out and said, “That dude looks exactly like Logic.” She told me not to point, but the guy noticed us and waved.

When Kennedy, Maddie and Meghan joined us, we found a place to sit. I saw the Logic lookalike walk out of the bar. To my surprise, he walked over to us and struck up conversation. His name was Jake, and he was a British student abroad in Spain.

You may have heard of Erasmus. It’s an EU-sponsored exchange program that lets European college students study abroad in other European countries. There was a sizable Erasmus group at La Universidad de Oviedo, and they had a giant group chat that the Calvin group had been added to. Jake recognized me from there.

We started talking comic books and the bit of British TV I had seen. Jake’s girlfriend Aimee joined us and really hit it off with the girls. Then Vasco, Jake’s flatmate, joined our conversation. We really hit it off, and the three of them invited us to their table inside.

We were introduced to more Erasmus students when we sat down: there was Rebecca, an Irish girl, and Dimitra, a girl from Greece; Joe, Rebecca’s boyfriend; Nick, another guy from the UK, and Alex, Jake and Vasco’s flatmate who had yet to follow Vasco on Instagram. I spent the next few hours socializing with the other people and talking rap music with Vasco.

Around 3 AM, talk turned to the clubs, and the consensus was eventually reached that the club district was our new destination. May I remind you of my feeling about the clubs:

I told the group I was good for the night. I got Jake and Vasco’s numbers before I left.

Super good night, with an opportunity to meet some new people. Would do again.

A Story with a Lot of Background

Background piece #1: Early in October, Prof. Pyper asked to speak with me. I went to her office to see what was up. She asked about my experience with José and Elisa. She told me that the two of them were concerned I was unhappy living with them.

My response was bewilderment, followed by comprehension. This was back in the struggle stage, where I only knew bits and pieces of Spanish. I’ve been told I’m pretty quiet in my native language, so I was on a speak when spoken to basis with my host parents due to a lack of language knowledge.

There were several words that could have described my time with José and Elisa. Confusing? Often. Frustrating? Occasionally. But they were good host parents, who were making efforts to breach the language barrier. You should also know I got the long end of the stick when it came to host parents. Elizabeth’s host mom had shipped off to Russia for a month-long vacation, and left Elizabeth alone in the apartment with only one of her host mom’s friends to come cook for her. Benji was living with an elderly, very sick host father, and most of his host mom’s time was spent taking care of him. (Benji eventually changed families, and his first host dad died not too long after.) Jessica’s host mom was trying to enforce a curfew, in spite of Jessica being a grown woman, and Tanner was paired up with a very abrasive host mom. Communicating with the Villas may have been difficult, but they were kind people who put me on a pretty long leash and told me when they were going to be out of the apartment.

Background piece #2: My mom has been long warning me about combining dairy and fish. Allegedly, the two don’t sit together well in Keene stomachs.

Background piece #3: One of the things my host mom frequently made as a meal was a type of sandwich. It was a double-decker, with ham, cheese and tuna fish. It was delicious, and since I felt fine after each time eating one, I had forgotten about my mom’s warning.

OK, all background established. Story now.

Dinner one Saturday night was fish along with personal cheese pizza. Not thinking it through, I ate my fish and helped myself to a few pieces of pizza. I finished dinner and headed back to my room to get ready for bed.

By the time I was out of the shower, my stomach was feeling peculiar. I sat on the toilet, wondering if I just needed to go to the bathroom, but nothing happened. I eventually hitched back up and went to bed. The night consisted of lying, staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep due to feeling like his stomach was going to rupture at any second. Every so often, I got up to try going to the bathroom, but nothing came of it. I saw a Hap commercial a while ago that started by saying, “One of your worst fears as a parent is for your kid to be halfway across the world and email you saying, ‘Mom, I’m sick.'” I can confirm, being the sender of that email is pretty scary as well.

The next morning, the feeling hadn’t gone away. I can’t remember if I told José and Elisa I wasn’t feeling 100% or if they figured it out on their own, but Elisa made me some tea and gave me medicine. I spent most of the day sitting around my bedroom, praying that I would be able to move without feeling like my stomach would drop out of me.

More than anything, I felt tense. Elisa was a great cook, and I was worried trying to tell her fish and dairy mixed poorly in my stomach would come out as an insult rather than an explanation.

José broke the tension. I was fiddling with my iPad when he popped his head into my room. “Noah,” he said sheepishly. He paused, whipped out his translator, and then handed his phone to me. I read the translation: ¿Tienes diarrea? (Do you have diarrhea?)

I almost busted out laughing, and assured him that was not the problem.

I ended up skipping the night service at the evangelical church that night, but I felt good enough to tell Elisa about the volatile cocktail fish and dairy made in my stomach.

Of the four months living with José and Elisa, this was the moment they became like real parents to me. I was a stranger who was still learning to speak their language, and who they were uncertain was happy living with them, and yet they cared for me as if I was their flesh and blood.

Well, that’s it for now. Thank you all for reading. May your hikes be wild boar-free, your encounters with rapper lookalikes result in you meeting some great dudes, and your host parents be understanding when you forget about your dietary no-nos. Adios.