In the last 24 hours we were going to be homeless for two days until we looked online for a room, the only available room was about 30 minutes North of Valencia on the beach.  A huge Ceramic Expo is here  for the week.  Our hotel apt. was booked through the fair when we got here, so we thought we would look elsewhere. One apt. at the Jesus metro station, might have been available but we missed the time when we were to call her and she rented it to a Physics professor.  After we had our reservations for Sagunto (where the townspeople burned the town rather than turn it over to Hannibal) I came back to the apt. and there had been a cancellation! Yes!  The only snag was that it was 117 euros and we had been paying pre-feria prices of 50.euros  Oh, well.  It is a challenge to stay upright and grounded.  It does feel like play money.  We keep looking for the crumbs to follow. In the end it all will work out, it's just in the moment to moment things that there is total upheaval. The major accomplishment last night was going on-line in Spanish and cancelling the reservation for Sagunto and the train reservations.  It may have taken 45 minutes to figure out what all the technical terms meant in Spanish.  Not a one of them was in my cheap dictionary.  David's birthday is tonight-so we will go out to dinner with Olga Gil-Medrano.

Our wild journey today involved visiting a 3 bedroom house with a two-tiered gardens, a terrace off the dining room, a fireplace and hopefully an internet connection.  The trip out of the city didn't start all that well as we took a train to Paterna, 4 stops short of where we were going, La Canyada.  The graffiti at the train station was pretty third world, and prior to the stop I managed to get my purse caught in the train door and it took 4 people to get it out.  I was in a panic.  People were quite nice and helpful.  Dumb American.  It's ok, (vale) everyone here thinks we are German or British.  Guess that makes sense.

There were a few things lost in translation.  Like we thought the deposit was 300 euros and it turns out it was 1000.  David got a check today from Univ. of  Valencia that will cover first month's rent and deposit.  We meet Isabel, the owner tomorrow morning to sign the papers, at a bank- they will check the validity of the check and we will sign over 2,000 euros.  This is all amazing.  Expensive and amazing.  

But Isabel's son in law speaks fluent english - so hopefully we will have a list for him to handle week after next.  We will have Spanish TV, DVD's and internet.  Huge kitchen.  Pictures await.  David took some with his little camera there.  I was so tired trying to translate that my gray matter is somewhat coagulated.  Like it's amazing that I am writing this.  It was like being in Mexico and going for a day with an entire busload of Mexicanos 33 years ago.  The brain, she is like putty.  But after we move next Wednesday- have food in the house and buy some sweaters to keep us warm, all will be well.  

So feel free to join us.  There is room for a really big party here.  Earlier in the day we went to see a 1 bdrm. apt in the city center-occupied by a really nutty& bombastic beauty from Latin America.  David's most obvious reaction was that her boobs were jumping out at him, served on a platter so to speak, when she hugged and kissed him.  It was wild.  All part of the journey. Across the way was a construction site. So during working hours, no privacy with workers ogling into apartments.

I think we will be happy, it's 5.5 k (3.5 miles)to David's office which is a good commute for him.

Trains are going to be interesting.  I think we can take a free bus to Paterna) two towns down--where trains are more frequent without walking over giant hills. But we may need to get a tandem for David to do all the work or a scooter.  Some adjusting to do.

We arrived with more luggage than anyone should have- 4 big bags, 2 little bags and a humongous bicycle carrier for - David's bicycle.  The flights were easy except for our good luck of sitting in front of two very sick babies,an exhausted British Mum, and her husband who was coughing up a lung here and there.  Olga Gil, David's compadre in Matematicas at the Univ. of Valencia ,Burjassot met us at Manises airport with her jaws dropped.  It took two taxis for all our stuff to get to our home for two weeks, Living Valencia, in the Plaza de la Merced.  A lovely old building that is home to one of the oldest housewares shops in the city, Mas Masia. 

It has been a great place to start!  Olga took us to a French restaurant our first night Chez Lyon. Spectacular food with good Rioja wine.  What we have realized now is how difficult it is to adjust to different appliances in the kitchen, dishwasher and washing machine that you need to set the temperature, size of the load and the television - oh the television.  It took us 2 hours to figure out how to turn on the tv there wer 3 unmarked remotes.  David finally successfully turned on the tv after midnight to discover many sex channels and no CNN.  Our ears are not yet attuned to Valencian Spanish and David is especially noticing that his French doesn't work in lieu of all  Spanish words.  

The technical things have shamed us.  But it's not killing us.  We discovered how to get new SIM cards for our cell phones for 15 euros a piece, then just yesterday we found out that you can add more euros, thus minutes, to your cell phone through ATM's.  Many people have pay as you go phones here.  There is no A to B for gringo tourists.  There is just, false start one, default false start two, and blindly lucking into the answer.  

We have had two bites on apartments, one from a lovely American woman who was so kind as to connect us to her two good friends in Valencia who are artists working to get the new Valencia Zoo ready to open next year.  Unfortunately the apt was too far away, but at the beach.  We will look at another apt. tomorrow.  A mathematician's mother is interested in renting her apartment to us for 550 euros.  It is just South of the old city, easily connecting to Metro.  So we will see what happens.

In the meantime we are discovering the Central Market (Mercat Central) in Valenciano the dialect spoken in Valencia. David was mesmerized at the Market which is a block from where we are staying.  Lots of oranges, jamon and fresh vegetables.  Teas for whatever ails you.  Valencia is sort of the bread basket of Europe.  Long growing season.  There are flowers blooming and the temperature has been about 16 degrees Celsius- maybe 50 degrees F.

I have done pretty well physically, we are walking quite a bit. The only downside has been that our temporary apt. has the tempurpedic mattress which I'm allergic to and lots of wooden cabinets that have pressed wood in them.  Hack, hack, cough cough. But I will survive.  Taking pills to counteract it all.  I realize what a little cocoon we have in Fountain Hill, with so few pollutants in the house.  New is clearly viewed here as "better."  People are shocked when we say we prefer older apartments with real wood furnishings.  IKEA like furniture has made it here in a big way.  

David met about ten cyclists on Sunday at the Plaza de Toros in downtown Valencia for a ride, maybe 70 k, to the north near the mountains where he trekked to a fresh spring.  The cyclists are hardy, at their lunch, several had beers which amazed David as they made a quite circuitous ride back down the mountain. But he has found his group!  Several people spoke English and his GPS unit has gotten him back and forth quite easily.  He just has to keep batteries charged.

Let us hear from you via email or I think  you can respond to this posting, but not sure yet.

About ten o'clock p.m. on October 8th (the night before we got on a bus for the Big Apple to visit the Spanish Consulate), David said "I need 3 passport photos for my visa application."  So I thought to myself, this can't be too difficult.  In ten minutes I created a mini digital passport studio in our living room.  Complete with lamps with their shades off to be sure there was no shadow!  It had to be perfect.  So I guessed at the dimensions and when I thought I had it right I tried to figure out how to determine whether the distance from his chin to the top of his head was between 25 and 35 mm. At midnight I discovered the picture had to have a half-inch clearance on the top for the passport cutting tools so they wouldn't decapitate the applicant. My Photoshop program automatically reduced the top to 1/8 inch. Grrr. At this point I gave up and figured, while the effort was a good one I did not have all the tools to accomplish this task. There is a reason you can go to the drugstore to get the photos, which we did in the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City while waiting for our bus back to Bethlehem the next day. Needless to say, we discovered how ridiculous our original thought of going the next daying and actually applying for a visa was.  Turns out we did not even have the right visa application.  We have to go on a student research visa.

The next morning in New York we realized exactly how clueless we were.  We thought only David applied for the visa in my name.  Turns out I needed 3 copies of the Schengen application as well and 3 passport pictures of me too.  It's a comedy of errors.  Next week we go to New York to apply for the visas.  We also discovered we didnot have to have a criminal check because we will be there for less than 180 days.  Check out the first photo- the evidence of the criminal element in action.