Okay... I'm back in New York after 11 wonderful (albiet very stressful at times) days in Spain.

It was wonderful to meet some of you at the dinner in Madrid. Sorry I was kind of out of it and couldn't stay out... I hadn't slept in lord knows how many days and I was dealing with the stress of not having a place to go the next night and how exactly I was going to murder my friend for going to Bilbao without warning.

I spent the first day and a half in Madrid, although I didn't really do anything. the first night was spent arguing with Air France over where the hell my luggage was. The second was spent waiting in line to see my Busta. Third day I headed off to Vigo and had a WONDERFUL time with my friends up there. The chapapote hadn't reached my best friend's town yet, so we spent many hours just walking up and down the beaches looking out at the water and enjoying the ocean. Unforuntately, it did arrive 2 days after I left without any warning.

From Vigo I went to Granada (with short stops to change buses/trains in Madrid and Sevilla) to meet La Rosa de Espana. She is the sweetest most beautiful person, inside and out, that I have ever met in my life. We were literally crying on each other when we hugged... And her father invited me to sit at her table during the dinner!! Que viva la Rosa de Espana!! Te queremos!!

From Granada it was back to Madrid, where I met you guys after 2 sleepless nights and the stress of trying to find a place to stay cause my friend just randomly up and went to Bilbao to see Bustamante without any advance notice. She will die. But luckily I have amazing wonderful friends in Galicia and my student in Madrid and they were able to help me find a place to sleep.

I spent the last few days in Madrid and on my last day a friend came up from Sevilla and we did the whole touristy thing. He'd only been to Madrid once in his life. He kept saying, "They hate me here because I'm Andalucian!! Don't you see the way they look at me? It's discrimination!" Okay Pablo, whatever. Maybe he should have left the "Andalucia" shirt at home

Overall it was a wonderful vacation and I'm paying for it with a nasty cold that I developed on the plane. And Air France destroyed my luggage on the way home. I hate Air France. I will never fly it again!!

Hope everyone else had a wonderful time over the holidays and maybe one day we'll catch each other again!

Melinda

Oh, and of course, here's my best memory of Spain