La Sevillana

Sevilla is one of those places that is fun to wander without purpose. Wandering around the city you'll smell wonderful flavors, see beautiful Sevillano patios, and hear flamenco. Besides the touristy stuff to do, Sevilla has a very active art scene and nightlife. Read on for more specifics.

Quick Tips:

*WALK, WALK, WALK *Visit in the Spring, but not during the festivals unless you know someone with whom you can stay. *Hit the small neighborhoods. *Find a small magazine (found in most bars) for the latest on nightlife

Best Way To Get Around:

*WALK, WALK, WALK *Make sure that the taxi meter starts at zero *Excellent Buses (you can buy a BONOBUS which is 10 rides for 620 pesetas at many kiosks) *Trains are great for visiting neighboring towns

'Chema' is located in the bohemian neighborhood of Triana which is famous for its ceramics and is located on the other side of the Guadalquivir River than the city center. 'Chema' is one of my favorites in Sevilla and I have taken my parents and a good friend here and everyone left more than satisfied. Since the Spanish don't eat until way after my father's bedtime, we were the only ones in the place and had excellent service by owner Jose' Maria Chema who serves a delicious meal with humor and grace. Start your meal with a bottle of the house wine (which you can take with you for 800 pesetas = about $5 May 2001.) Both red and white are delicious and very inexpensive. Don't forget to order a side of olives while you're reading the menu. For the first course I had gazpacho which in Andalucia is served in a glass as a drink, not as a soup. Everything here is delicious, so I won't be repetitive. I've also had the house salad which consists of chopped tomatoes, onions, peppers and fish eggs. (Don't expect lettuce, carrots, etc...) The restaraunt is known for its fish cooked in Salt. The fish is placed in a casserole dish and covered with a layer of salt, but the fish only obsorbs what it needs and doesn't taste salty, but is cooked to perfection. Ask your waiter to serve it at the table because there is a definite art to deboning and serving the fish. Do order desert. Jose' Maria will prepare a mixed plate if you can't decide what to order. My only complaint about this place is that sometimes they don't have some of the things that are on the menu. You can also have tapas outside if it is nice or in the little bar in the front. Their tapas aren't the ordinary tapas you'll find in most places in the center.

The second week in April was Holy Week and Sevilla goes mad. It's a VERY VERY VERY IMPORTANT holiday here. Each of the 54 churches spends all year preparing for the Holy Week march from their church to Sevilla's main Cathedral (3rd largest Catholic Cathedral). There are thousands of penitants (looking much like the KKK, but don't be scared) walking barefoot, carrying crosses, floats of the Virgin Mary and Jesus in gold, silver and jewels, spontaneous songs from people in their balconies proclaiming their love for the Virgin, G-d and Jesus, rosemary, trumpets, drums and zillions of spectators. It's really hard to conduct daily life because you can't go anywhere without bumping into a PASEO. They take over an hour to pass a certain spot because the floats are carried on the necks of approximately 40 men down narrow streets. It's very beautiful and moving in an odd way but after watching two or three and dealing with the crowds of people, you've had enough. So I took off to the beach with a few friends for a long weekend with Kali of course who had a great time chasing the water.

TODAY is the first day of LA FERIA DE SEVILLA (the Spring Festival of Sevilla) which is a huge week-long party and very famous in Spain. It originally was a big gathering of everyone from all of the villages who came to sell their horses and other livestock, but now it's famous for drinking FINO (a type of sherry) and dancing Sevillanas (a popular-flamenco-like dance.)

This is the holiday where the women wear the flamenco dresses with lots of flounces in every color combination, pile their hair up in a bun and top it with a flower and the men wear bolero suits. Okay, not everyone dresses up like this, but it's also a holiday of posers.

The FERIA takes place in a specific part of the city where they set up streets and tent-houses, some of which are public and private. The private ones are usually owned by wealthier families or pretending-to-be-wealthy families (i.e. going into debt to outdo the Joneses or in this case the Rodriquezes.) I happen to be invited to one of these private ''casetas'' owned by Pepe PICKMAN. The Pickmans were a very wealthy family of title (the Marques de Pickman still lives) who are still well-off, but not like before. They owned a very famous ceramic factory in Sevilla from about 1820 to 1970's. We don't know if they are any relation of mine, but they got a kick out of me contacting them and called me ''niece'' and ''cousin.''

I'm settling into a ''normal'' life here. The pace is much slower than what I'm used to, but that translates into a higher quality of life in most cases. I'm not talking about having more stuff, but having enough stuff and having time to enjoy it. Parents don't worry when their kids are playing out in the street corners and there's very little violent crime here. For you news junkies: watching the news is weird because instead of the 15 second sound bite, you have two minutes of sound bites from the president's press conference (although the editing sucks). News is actually news. Of course the broadcasts have a point of view, but at least they cover other stuff besides car chases and shootings (which exist but aren't that common here.) They do have the trash that we have, too, but it doesn't seem so prevalent.

The first week I was here, Michael (a friend) was visiting and we spent the weekend in Sevilla, then went to a small village called Aracena with friends of mine and then to Granada for a few days. Aracena is famous for its ham and we ate well. Ham here is much better than anything you'd get at Honey-Baked. It's better than proscuitto. Someone told me (don't know if it's true) that Spain ships its olive oil and ham to Italy where it is repackaged and sold as Italian Extra Virgin and Prosciutto. My friends brother showed us around Granada which was fabulous because he showed us things we never would have seen or noticed and told us the legends that belonged with some of the monuments.

For the last two weeks I've been going out (ALOT), settling in, figuring out where to buy towels, get my clothes dry cleaned, seeing old friends, finding out all of the good tapas bars, reading, writing and absorbing.