Happy Valencia Day!

Tomorrow we celebrate The National Day of Valencia!  Meaning for most people here, a day off work and school.  From the little I understood from my Spanish teacher explaining to me (in Spanish of course), and a quick browse on Wikipedia… October 9 is The Day of the Valencian Community, celebrating the entrance of King James I into Valencia in 1238, and the dawn of the Kingdom of Valencia.  For a rather interesting summation, you can go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Valencia.  If you check it out, don’t miss the brief plug for the Americas in there.  Whoot whoot!!  So Jake and I may go watch fireworks in the park later tonight with the rest of the city.  J

Though we have already seen and heard our fair share of fireworks.  On Sundays I have to remind myself that there is not a drive-by shooting happening every half hour.  Apparently, many of the Catholic churches here light fireworks in celebration of someone taking their first communion!  Sort of the rite-of-passage after one’s long run of confirmation classes.  There are fireworks going off all the time for other random and minor occasions as well.  “We got a new puppy!”… Fireworks!  “My kid lost a tooth!”… Fireworks!  “It’s dinner time!”… Fireworks!  We better be careful when we move back to LA.  There will be a drive-by down the street, and I’ll probably think it’s fireworks and go out to see the show. 

So tomorrow is like Saturday since neither Jake nor I have school!  We’ll see if we actually do anything, since the last two Saturdays we have really just stayed inside all day.  But that’s ok, he gets work done, and it’s really the only day that I just chill.  I have school every morning, and I’m working, tutoring a couple of girls in English every afternoon/evening.  The girls are very sweet, and thankfully the mom said that she’d prefer a more casual/informal lesson approach since they’ve just been at school all day.   I always come with a plan, but it’s nice to be able to improvise with fun activities when the girls seem to lose interest.  We do lots of songs (and thanks to YouTube, music videos as well!); I read them storybooks in English, and then we reenact the story; I make up games with flashcards.  Yesterday, we basically played animal charades.  So, it’s pretty fun.  Hopefully, we can continue for a while because I’m hoping this will pay for my Spanish school in the end.  

Just for the record, my Spanish class this week consists of a Chinese guy, a Greek girl, a German girl, two French girls, a Russian girl, an Italian girl, … and of course we can’t forget Miss America! Unfortunately, this week only half of the class knows English, so no more English default.  L   That’s ok.  Sticking with Spanish is a lot better than everyone reverting to German as before! 

So far this week has been filled with some nice surprises.  On Friday, Jake and I went to our Berklee choir practice as usual.  Ironically, there were twice as many guys as girls, and 3 times as many altos as sopranos.  So the soprano section consisted of yours truly as the soloist. ;)  Luckily it’s a pretty chill environment, and my usual fears of looking like a fool were transformed into a fun challenge to conquer.  One of the girls who was helping to head up the rehearsal and accompany us yelled over from the piano, “She sounds good!  We should make it a solo for her.”  By now, everyone knows that I am not a Berklee student, so I think they all knew how good that made me feel.  I was singing all the way home.

Then on Sunday, Jake and I went to church.  (Our first time making it there with no transportation mishaps or stresses!).  For one, I actually picked up on what the Pastor was talking about this time!  Whoo hoo!  Now I don’t know if that’s because the sermon topic was simpler than usual, or because we sat in a different location with his amplified voice reverberating differently, or the fact that the chairs in the new location were padded, or because I’m actually comprehending more Spanish.  I guess next week will tell.  After service, the worship leader (Andres, Bonnie’s husband) called me into a room along with the rest of the people who had auditioned for the church “choir” last Monday.  He started giving a speech to everyone in Spanish.  I was totally lost, and waiting for a good moment for MariEli to translate for me.  I figured we were all in there because we were the new church choir and he was giving us a pep talk, going to explain when rehearsals begin, and the usual stuff.  Then I heard my name, and a little explanation about me, along with one other guy.  Still not sure what was being said, I figured we were selected as some sort of section leader or something.  Then as we left the room, I got a couple of pats on the back while I was chasing down MariEli to translate for me.  She told me that Andres was telling everyone that they judged based on 3 categories: 1-intonation, 2-rhythm, 3-attitude.  I asked her why he said my name.  She said, that Vincent (the other guy) and I were the only ones who met all three points.  I thought, “Ok, that’s nice,” still figuring that I will be called to work with others in the choir or something like that.  Not until we had left the church did I finally pick up on the fact that only Vincent and I were selected.  So, slowly but surely I’ve begun to realize that this “coro” I was auditioning for, is actually singers for the worship band?  Maybe?  I will find out next Monday when we rehearse for the first time.  Either way, I’m just so uplifted and encouraged to be able to sing in the church.  I’m just glad, “speaking Spanish” was not one of the 3 required points!  This week has made me feel like maybe there is something special about my voice, though I have a record of putting it down and hiding it away. Maybe it’s actually meant to be shared.  Especially considering how much my heart soars when I am singing, I feel like I fly right out of this world.  Don’t tell my neighbors, but I’ve been busting out the YouTube karaoke the past couple of days.  Hopefully they think it’s the TV turned up really loud.  J 

After church we went over to Bonnie and Andres’ house for lunch.  Bonnie had been talking to me all week about making us a Valencian dish called, Arroz al Horno.  It’s rice cooked in the oven with chorizo, pork, garbanzo beans, potatoes, garlic, tomatoes, and blood sausage (though she left the latter ingredient out, thankfully!).  Bonnie is helping me expand my Spanish recipe book.  Such a great Sunday afternoon for us.  Jake and Andres talked music, while sharing self-produced music videos and album songs.  Andres is a really really talented guy.  He’s a rockin’ pianist and singer, yet he’s crazy for hip-hop, and a crazy good rap artist!  He wrote, directed, produced, edited, his own music videos and they could totally pass for professional.  We are really enjoying getting to know this family more.  Not to mention we got to be a part of the awesome news that they have another baby on the way!  And we will be here through the whole process.  We feel so privileged.  

We got home on Sunday in time for Jake to finish up his piece for the recording session the next day.  He had this crazy idea to write the middle section backwards for the musicians to play, and then flip the track so all the instrumentation and dynamics had this inverse sounding affect.  He did it once in one of his rock recordings, and he thought it would be cool for this eerie scene he was assigned to compose to.  Considering the work he put into to write it twice (once forwards and once backwards), and then cue everything up properly while basically thinking inversely, he really pulled it off.  He was nervous, knowing he was taking a gamble.  I called him on my way home and he was so excited because he had just gotten home after the recording session and immediately went to his computer to reverse the tracks.  He told me with glee, “It worked!  It lined up perfectly!”  There’s still mixing to be done, but he is so encouraged that his risking taking did not end with a flop!  The reverse affect was more slight than expected with these particular instruments, so he said it may not be worth such an endeavor in the future unless with electric instruments.   But regardless, a great learning experience.  

With this assignment off his plate his week is looking more slim than usual.  Lucky me!  So hopefully we will go out and do something cool for Valencia Day!!  I’ll keep you posted.