Last Christmas

Two years ago, I spent Christmas in Granada (the south of Spain.) Granada is a small town. After 3 days, I was recognizing people and stray dogs. I saw our waiter from the teahouse later at a bar. Hiking up to the Alhambra, I recognized a dog that had been hanging around the Plaza Nueva at breakfast. We were staying at this great hostel where we had really hit it off with the manager. In fact, he kept the hostel open over Xmas for us. He took us out with a bunch of his friends to show us the "non-touristico" places etc.

Christmas day: Saj, Roderigo and I sat out on the hostel's front porch reading. The hostel was up in the Albaycin, the old Moorish quarter, so the porch had a phenomenal view: the Alhambra with the Sierra Nevada mountains as a backdrop, and then all of Granada. Each of us was wrapped in a blanket. I remember I was reading "Daughter of Fortune" (Isabel Allende.) We had prepared a spread: artichoke hearts, different cheeses, olives (to die for!), marinated mushrooms, bread, and chocolate. Roderigo provided the Cava (sort of like Spanish champagne.) We just sat out all day reading, snacking, and talking when we felt like it.

It was, in my mind, perfect. It's oddly intimate not to talk, to just pass the time with no expectations. We left the next day after awkwardly exchanging presents with Roderigo. We bought him Cava, and he bought us chocolate for the bus trip to Sevilla.