Never There Long - Iberian Peninsula (Part 1)

I was studying abroad my junior year of college in Spain and this woman was my host mother. She had a modest three-bedroom apartment that housed her and her two adult daughters in one room, as well as three American student transplants in the other two rooms.

       Photo “Spain 1” -  La Senora’s apartment was on the third floor of the building on the right. Her balcony was the one above the balcony with the flowers.

La Señora was an interesting woman. As I mentioned, she had only one functional hand. The other must have been stunted by some kind of birth defect, as it was small, twisted, and useless. That fact did not seem to slow La Señora down in the slightest. She cooked three meals a day for us: a small 8am breakfast, a large 3pm lunch, and a light 9pm dinner, all of which were always delicious. She took pride in cooking from scratch and demanded that we all be present to eat each meal together. Anytime I would stop by the apartment in between classes, I would inevitably find La Señora mopping the floors, washing the windows, doing laundry, prepping meals, or engaging in some essential task. The woman was an absolute machine, somehow managing to chain-smoke nonfiltered, so-called “black tobacco” cigarettes endlessly despite being down a hand.

La Señora was a serious woman. I could picture her in Franco’s Spain quite easily. She didn’t have time for nonsense or good humor. There was far too much work to be done, and that work was unlikely to get done by anyone other than herself. That fact instilled both pride and bitterness in her heart, it seemed to me.

This properly sets the stage for La Señora giving me the boot. I was about halfway through the semester’s classes. I was quite exhausted mentally, as - in an act of blatant hubris - I had chosen to enroll in full blown university-level classes that were taught completely in Spanish. I did this with only two semesters of college Spanish under my belt and the full knowledge that my Spanish basically sucked ass. Nonetheless, the idea of taking nothing but beginner-level language and grammar classes seemed so depressing that I instead opted for Spanish Literature, History of Religion in Spain, and Feminism in Spain.

The end result of this decision was that I spent nearly every waking hour of my days studying in some capacity, literally wearing the cover off my little yellow Spanish dictionary. My initial visions of wild debauchery and self-indulgent hedonism in the streets of Salamanca were dashed, and replaced by quiet days and nights of studious dedication reading books and writing papers in the University’s ancient stone buildings.

Then low and behold, I caught wind that there was a Spanish holiday on the near horizon, just a few days away. And a nice long one at that - a 4 day weekend. I can’t recall what the holiday was, just the sense of relief I felt at the idea of having a few days off to rest.

One evening at supper, La Señora asked us all what our plans were for the holiday weekend. To my great surprise, not only were the other American students aware of the extended holiday break, but they also had pretty extensive travel itineraries. One guy was going to Madrid with some friends to do some sightseeing. The other guy was taking a boat to the Canary Islands to do some beach-bumming. Good Lord, who are these people, I thought. I was nearly broke, having maybe a few hundred dollars to my name. A mid-semester mini-vacation was the furthest thing from my mind. So when the conversation came around to me, I simply said in Spanish, “Nothing. I don’t plan on going anywhere.”

Silence followed. It was the kind of silence that lingers painfully and unnaturally in the air. The two daughters of La Señora made nervous eye-contact with one another and then quietly excused themselves from the dinner table, which I found odd and slightly alarming. La Señora took a long drag off her cigarette and held it in a bit longer than usual. A small half-grin crossed her face as she looked at me and slowly exhaled the smoke.

“Excuse me, could you say that again?” she asked.

I knew she’d heard me the first time, so I tried to phrase things a little more deferentially this time. I said, “I didn’t know there was a holiday. I don’t have any plans. And I don’t really have any money to go anywhere.” My Spanish was pretty rough but I was confident that my simple message had gotten through.

What we all experienced next was a rant like no other. I have almost no idea what La Señora said, and still wouldn’t, had it not been for the post-supper translation my American comrades gave me. Their Spanish was far superior to mine, so they were able to absorb the fullness of her rapid ravings far better than I. Evidently the upcoming holiday was a Spanish national holiday, one that all Spaniards enjoyed and considered their right. La Señora’s humble opinion was that she would be damned if I was going to sit around her apartment all through the holiday expecting her to cook, clean, and attend to me. What about her vacation, her holiday from work? If I was unaware that there was a national holiday, that was my problem. I would be taking a vacation somewhere for the entirety of the extended break. That was that.

This was a real problem for me. I would somehow need to fend for myself for four days on essentially no money in a foreign land. This was my first experience learning how to travel on a shoestring budget. After the initial shock wore off, the first thing I did was go to the local used bookstore. I had stumbled upon it early after arrival to Salamanca on my walk to morning classes.

     Photos “Spain 5” and “Spain 6” - Caption: Narrow, winding streets and ancient stone buildings made my daily walks to classes feel like a journey into the past.

The bookstore had a decent little English section that catered to foreign students and I had noticed some travel books. Unfortunately, upon closer inspection, there were no travel books on Spain itself. There was, though, a used Lonely Planet guide to Portugal in English. Paging through it, it quickly became apparent that Portugal was dirt cheap. Hostels were cheap, food was cheap, wine was cheap, sightseeing was basically free. The capital Lisbon looked to be the main attraction, and - doing some quick monetary conversions - I calculated I could stay at a hostel for roughly $10 a night and eat for less than that daily. I could just stick to the museums, landmarks, and sights that were free. $20 a day seemed doable.

The cost of the train ticket seemed like a potential obstacle. How long of a train ride was it from Salamanca to Lisbon? I had no idea. I walked to the train station to find out. After chatting with a helpful and patient ticket agent about my desired trip, I got some pleasant information. Despite the fact that the journey by train would take almost 10 hours and involve several train changes, the price wasn’t bad at all. The equivalent of about $30 could get me to Portugal’s capital.

And so it was settled, in my mind anyway. It wasn’t like I had much of a choice. If I was going to get exiled from the apartment by La Señora, I was going to at least return with a story. $60 would cover the train, there and back. And I was confident I could make another $80 completely cover four-days’ worth of food and accommodations. Any other adventures that would unfold would have to be free, as this seemingly cheap $140 international adventure ate away about a third of my meager net worth at the time.

The sun rose on day one of the holiday break. I had a backpack stuffed with some clothes, a few books, and some rolling tobacco ready to go. The train left early, so besides La Señora, I was the first up and leaving the apartment that morning. I figured I’d just silently sneak out unnoticed and avoid any additional tongue lashings from my banisher.

But to my surprise, La Señora was waiting for me. I opened my bedroom door to find her staring directly at me. She was standing in the open doorway of the kitchen in her pajamas, smoking a cigarette with her good hand and cradling a paper bag against her body with her bad hand. It was obvious she had been expecting me.

Shit, I thought, I’d better say something. I hadn’t shared my plans with her. “I’m going to Portugal.” I said in the best Spanish I could muster. I wanted to impress her in that moment. “I’m going to the train station now. I’ll be back in a few days.” I knew all those words and she understood me perfectly.

She spoke slowly, in words I knew she was carefully choosing so I would understand. “I made you a bocadillo to eat. Take it with you.” She paused as we held eye contact. “I’ve never been to Portugal. Be careful because I’ve heard it can be dangerous there. Do you have any money?”

“A little bit. I’ll be okay. Portugal is really cheap.” I tried hard to sound like I knew what I was talking about.

She smiled, smirked a little, and shook her head. “Be careful and don’t lose the key to the apartment. I don’t have another one for you.”

I reached into my pocket. “Here.” I handed her the key. “I don’t want to lose it. I’ll have someone let me in the building when I get back.”

“No, you keep it. You might return late at night.” She put out her cigarette and handed me the bocadillo. She put her good hand on my shoulder and kissed me goodbye on both cheeks. She hadn’t done that since we were first introduced.

“Thank you for the food, señora.” I said and let myself out.

I made the 15-minute walk to the train station and bought my ticket to Lisbon. That about cleaned me out of cash, so I went to the ATM and withdrew about $100 worth of Spanish pesetas (Spain hadn’t yet switched to the Euro). I made a mental commitment to do my damnedest to complete my entire journey on that measly $100. I took it as a challenge.

And so off I went on the road - or more accurately on the rails - to Portugal, a country I had never intended to visit and had absolutely no knowledge of, other than what was in the thin, slightly-outdated Lonely Planet guide crammed in my backpack.

As I boarded the train, I did reflect on the fact that this could all go horribly wrong. Linguistically, I was in bad shape - I barely spoke Spanish and didn’t know a word of Portuguese. Financially, even the smallest unexpected expense or emergency would spell complete disaster, leaving me broke and stranded in an unknown country. And on the most basic level, I had no idea what I was doing. I wasn’t an international traveler. Hell, I’d never even been on a train, much less crossed international borders on one. I knew the names of the stops where I was supposed to change trains but had no idea how I’d know when I’d reached those stops. What if I missed one and wound up completely off-course? Was I allowed to back-track if needed, or would they just give me the boot? Fuck if I knew. I needed the train gods or the travel gods or, preferably, the dumb-luck gods on my side for this escapade to have any chance of success.

What really surprised me, though, was - despite all those facts - how little I cared. It was almost a purifying feeling to step onto that train, knowing that truly anything could happen. It felt good. This was a new feeling. Nothing was planned and I had no idea how things would unfold. The moment opened to complete fullness and nothing mattered except being totally engaged with the uncertain adventure.

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