My 2 Second Shelf Life

"Please say "Si Si"....say you and your Spanish eyes will wait for me..."


Since I'm refusing to let go of our trip to Spain, I thought that I'd share some observations with you.

Here are some:

There is no such thought as "I'm too old to wear that".
If Spain is any example, women are fashionistas until their dying breath.
Hair is dyed, fried and layed to the side...heels are worn until death.

The Spanish are very respectful of age and handicaps. Street lights have tweety bird sounds for the blind to know when to cross. Everything is wheelchair accessible. Buses all have designated seating for the handicapped and aged...and it's respected. Our friend Mystic told a story of his wife jumping up in the bus to let a woman sit down, and the woman said to him: "Do I look that old?"...a rule of thumb, I think would be...if Granny is wearing 3 inch heels, she's ok. She doesn't need a seat.


Spanish women check each other out.
They start at your shoes, and move up.

Shoes are a big deal in Spain.
There is at least one shoe store on every block, and people are impeccably dressed.
Don't even try to leave the house with your clothes not matching your shoes.
Even babies in prams have shoes matching their clothes, and often little umbrellas matching their prams...even when they're at the beach, their flip flops will match their bathing suit.

The Spanish love three things: their ice cream, their pork, and their shoes.

There are little tourist trip traps everywhere.
Doorways will have a little pointless ledge for you to trip over.
Ha Ha, you stupid tourist.

All bars have ingenious little hooks for women to hang their purses on.
Sounds like a stupid little thing...but it's monumentally convenient.
Toronto needs to look into it.

Speaking of Toronto looking into it...there is no reason why a small resort town like Cadiz should have a better transit system than a city like Toronto does.
But they do.
Their train systems work, their bus system works.
Toronto: Look into it.

Kids are well behaved.
They get a lot of attention.
They're loved...but...inappropriate behaviour is not tolerated.
Moms will slap their children, strangers will tell kids off...and kids say things like "excuse", "gracias".
Sounds minor, but it took me a few days to not cringe like I do here when a family sat down next to us in a restaurant...kids played.
They didn't terrorize.
Please explain to me what the difference in parenting styles is.

The Spanish language sounds like Greek to me.
There is a lot of  the "th" sound.
So that many us assume that they would lisp when they speak English.
They don't.
They have a very sexy accent when they speak English. Pleasant to the ear.

Observations of Morocco to come...